Family Trends

This past week in class we talked about family trends that are occurring in the world today. When I say "trends" I do not mean what is trendy or trending on social media, but rather I mean "trends" as identifiable patterns. Some of the most noticeable trends include: premarital sex, births to unmarried women, living alone, cohabitation, delayed marriage, birth rates, household size, employed mothers, and divorce.

Here are the stats:
Premarital sex: There has always been premarital sex, but in 2010 a survey said 48% of high schoolers had had sex.
Births to unmarried women: In 2007, 39.7% of births were to unmarried women.
Living alone: In 2009, there were 31.7 million Americans living alone.
Cohabitation: In 2008 there were more than 6.1 million unmarried couples living together.
Delayed marriage: Today the average age for a woman to get married is 26 years and the average age for a man to get married is 28 years.
Birth rates: The average number of children couples have is 2.
Household size: In 2015 the average household size in the US was 2.54 people.
Employed mothers: In 2007, 62.6% of American mothers worked in the workforce. Most of these mothers had children 6 years and younger.
Divorce: This trend is the trickiest to explain, because most people say that the divorce rate is 50% when in reality it is not. People like to exaggerate this number. It is safe to say though, that the number of divorces has increased since the 1960's.

Now, you might be wondering why I just gave you all these statistics. Well, because people are cohabitating, they are delaying marriage. Because people are delaying marriage, birth rates have gone down. Because birth rates have gone down, household size have decreased.

Also, because people are cohabitating, the number of births to unmarried women are increasing. Because births to unmarried women are increasing, the number of employed mothers are increasing.

Are you seeing what I’m seeing? I’ll try one more. The increased number of people living alone also contributes to the smaller average house size. 

From these observations it is easily noted that the idea of a traditional marriage  is not as popular as it used to be.  I don't know about you, but that saddens me. My family means everything to me. I would not be the person I am today without the family relationships that I have. I think Elder L. Tom Perry has said it best: "The family is the center of life and it is the key to eternal happiness." I know that not everyone had the opportunity to grow up in a family with a mother and a father and siblings, but that doesn't mean you can't have one of your own. Satan is working ever so hard to tear apart families and it is our job as the rising generation to build up strong families unto God. That is my hope and my prayer. 

Side Notes:
*Statistics are from the book "Marriage and Family: The quest for intimacy" 8th addition By: Robert and Jeanette Lauer.
*I know some of these statistics are out of date, but I think we all get the point that the value for a marriage and family have gone down tremendously.