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This study investigated religiousness and couple well-being as mediated by relational virtue and equality. Relational spiritual framework theory posits that religiousness is associated with couple well-being through relational virtues (e.g., forgiveness, commitment, and sacrifice). Theories of relational inequality postulate that religion decreases couple well-being and indirectly lessens couple well-being. Data from a 3-year longitudinal community sample of 354 married couples were used. The authors found that religiousness's relationship to couple well-being was fully mediated by relational virtue but was not connected to relational inequality. They also found that relational inequality was associated with women's conflict, men's conflict, and marital instability. They did not find that higher religiousness benefits marital outcomes directly. Although these findings do not support the idea that religious activities are directly associated with stronger relationships, the data did show that religiousness can contribute to expressed relational virtue, and relational virtue in turn is associated with marital well-being.

Coming out of the closet, a concept originating in American culture and consistent with the paradigm of conversion, has been embraced by many Polish LGBT+ activists. However, literary coming-out narratives have played a relatively minor role in Polish homoerotic writings while a prominent American gay coming-out novel has not had significant resonance after it was published in Polish translation, suggesting that neither the coming-out story nor the rhetorical act of coming out has been adopted without reservation. Moreover, a contemporary call for Polish lesbian women and gay men to come out in order to promote marriage equality seems more directly aligned with the present-day U.S. political context than with any broadly accepted local activist position on the question of same-sex marriage. Given the absence of consensus about the meaning and the goal of coming out, or even its appropriateness, verbal coming out cannot function as performative speech in the Polish context, where it is better understood as periperformative speech (Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick).

This study examines how newly married couples respond to social-contextual factors which both encourage and inhibit marital equality. This analysis of in-depth interviews with 12 egalitarian heterosexual couples in their first year of marriage reveals that none of the couples fully meets the criteria for equal marriages defined in the study, although all the couples talked about their reltionships using a \"language of equality.\" Conscious confrontation of both gender and equality issues appeared to be a prerequisite for the possibility of marital equality. Yet most couples avoided these issues and developed a \"myth of equality.\" Implications for couples, research, and practice are addressed.

This chapter contains sections titled: Sex Is Morally Problematic Sex Is (Conditionally) Good Exchanging Ourselves: Marriage in the Moralphilosophie Collins Kant and Political Liberalism Transforming Ourselves into Husbands and Wives: Marriage in the Metaphysics of Morals Is Something Wrong Because It Is Unnatural? Pleasure as an End of Nature Marital Equality as a Criterion of Legitimacy How the Same‐Sex Marriage Debate Should Proceed

Two dominant theories within family research foresee a long-term decline in marriage, fertility, and partner stability. They also assume that this \"less-family\" scenario will be spearheaded by higher-educated strata. Trends in the latter half of the twentieth century seemed to provide ample support for both predictions. However, recent signs of change in family behavior raise doubts about their continued validity. In a number of countries we see a halt to, and even reversal of, fertility decline and of couple instability. In parallel, we observe a reversal of the social gradient on both dimensions. Applying a multiple equilibrium framework, we propose a theoretical framework that helps explain both the phase of marital and fertility decline and the subsequent recovery. We focus especially on the endogenous dynamics of the process, which, we argue, depend on the conditions that favor rapid diffusion. Our core argument is that the turnaround is driven by the diffusion of gender-egalitarian norms.

Gendered trends in housework provide an important insight into changing gender inequality. In particular, they shed light on the debate over the stalling of the 'gender revolution'. Additionally, the gender division of housework is significantly related to couple well-being; disagreements over housework are among the major sources of marital conflict. The objective is to bring the evidence on gendered trends in time spent on core housework up to date, and to investigate cross-national variation in those trends. Using 66 time use surveys from 19 countries, we apply a random-intercept, random-slope model to investigate half a century of change in gender differences in housework (1961-2011). There is a general movement in the direction of greater gender equality, but with significant country differences in both the level and the pace of convergence. Specifically, there was a slowing of gender convergence from the late 1980s in those countries where men and women's time in housework was already more equal, with steeper gender convergence continuing in those countries where the gender division of housework was less equal. Our findings support the view that despite short-term stalls, slow-downs, and even reverses, as well as important differences in national policy contexts, the overall cross-national picture shows a continuing trend towards greater gender equality in the performance of housework.

Background Quality of life (QoL) is an important component of individuals’ general well-being, particularly in older adults. However, factors influencing QoL among older adults in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) have not been fully examined. Furthermore, the role of gender differences in relation to QoL in multiple LMICs has also not been examined in detail. Methods This study used data from the World Health Organization’s Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE), Wave-1. Based on a literature review of existing works, a set of variables—an independent variable and covariates—were selected. The study sample consisted of 33,019 participants aged 50 years and above from China, Ghana, India, Russia, and South Africa. Multivariate linear regression models were estimated with the World Health Organization QoL scores as the dependent variable. To preserve the analytical sample size, multiple imputation was used to account for missing data. Results The results showed that generally, male older adults reported a better QoL than female older adults across all of the countries. The associations between QoL and sociodemographic factors, health-related factors, and social support factors among older adults differed according to country. Conclusions This study provides a better understanding of QoL among older adults in LMICs, which can help prepare LMICs to better address the QoL of older adults. The results of this study can be used to develop programs to promote better living standards and services to reduce gender disparities and ultimately, to improve the QoL among older adults in LMICs.

In the wake of Obergefell v. Hodges, courts and legislatures claim in principle to have repudiated the privileging of different-sex over same-sex couples and men over women in the legal regulation of the family. But as struggles over assisted reproductive technologies (ART) demonstrate, in the law of parental recognition such privileging remains. Those who break from traditional norms of gender and sexuality—women who separate motherhood from biological ties (for instance, through surrogacy), and women and men who form families with a same-sex partner—often find their parent-child relationships discounted. This Article explores what it means to fully vindicate gender and sexual-orientation equality in the law of parental recognition. It does so by situating the treatment of families formed through ART within a longer history of parentage. Inequalities that persist in contemporary law are traceable to earlier eras. In initially defining parentage through marriage, the common law embedded parenthood within a gender-hierarchical, heterosexual order. Eventually, courts and legislatures repudiated the common-law regime and protected biological parent-child relationships formed outside marriage. While this effort to derive parental recognition from biological connection was animated by egalitarian impulses, it too operated within a gender-differentiated, heterosexual paradigm. Today, the law increasingly accommodates families formed through ART, and, in doing so, recognizes parents on not only biological but also social grounds. Yet, as courts and legislatures approach the parental claims of women and same-sex couples within existing frameworks organized around marital and biological relationships, they reproduce some of the very gender- and sexuality-based asymmetries embedded in those frameworks. With biological connection continuing to anchor nonmarital parenthood, unmarried gays and lesbians face barriers to parental recognition. With the gender-differentiated, heterosexual family continuing to structure marital parenthood, the law organizes the legal family around a biological mother. Against this back-drop, nonbiological mothers in different-sex couples, as well as nonbiological fathers in same-sex couples, struggle for parental recognition. To protect the parental interests of women and of gays and lesbians, this Article urges greater emphasis on parenthood's social dimensions. Of course, as our common law origins demonstrate, the law has long recognized parental relationships on social and not simply biological grounds. But today, commitments to equality require reorienting family law in ways that ground parental recognition more fully and evenhandedly in social contributions. While this Article focuses primarily on reform of family law at the state level, it also contemplates eventual constitutional oversight.

Background We sought to identify the types of care and care resources available to older Korean adults with disabilities, and document the inequality in care received according to gender, marital status, and socioeconomic status. Method Data were derived from the sixth wave of the Korean Longitudinal Study of Ageing. The sample consisted of 946 men and women who were disabled in ADL and IADL. Generalized linear models and analyses of covariance were used to evaluate group differences in types of care received and care resources. The outcome variables were main primary caregivers, the total number of available caregivers, hours of care received per day, number of days of care, and fees paid to caregivers. Results In total, 41.7% of men with ADL/IADL disabilities reported that they did not receive formal or informal care from any source, compared with 30.7% of women. Almost half (49.2%) of men without a spouse were in a state of care deficit (vs. 30.8% in women without a spouse, P  < 0.001). Among care recipients, men reported receiving higher average days of care per month than women (25.6 vs. 21.2 days, P  < 0.01). Both men and women received care primarily from their spouse, but adult children were more frequently care providers for older women than men. A combination of care from spouse and paid caregiver was more frequent among women. Dependent older people with high household incomes had a higher likelihood of receiving care There was the clear gradient in rate of paid formal caregivers use by household income (higher income = higher use) among women but not men. Conclusions Care types and resources among disabled older adults appeared to be different by gender, marital status and socioeconomic status under the cultural phenomenon and contextual circumstances in the aging Korean population.

As households have become increasingly financialized, family scholars have considered the consequences of assets, credit, and debt for family dynamics. Previous studies that focused on labor force participation or earnings found that inequality between partners has important gendered consequences for relationship stability. We expand on this by considering within-couple financial inequality—the extent to which partners hold assets and debts unequally—and its implications for marital stability. Two competing perspectives—financial equality and financial specialization—offer different predictions. Using data from the 1996–2008 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), we find strong support for the financial equality perspective and little support for the financial specialization perspective. Couples with equal holdings have the most stable marriages. We also find that the positive association between equal financial holdings and marital stability is driven primarily by financial integration, or joint holdings. In some cases, we also find support for a modified version of the gendered institution perspective, as marriages with female partners holding most of the asset or debt are less stable than marriages with male partners holding most or partners holding them equally. We further distinguish among different types of assets and debts in our analyses, in recognition of the growing diversity of financial holdings and their varied implications for relationship quality and stability.