Cohabitation

This article is about a living arrangement. For the situation in governmental politics, see Cohabitation (government).

Cohabitation is an arrangement where two people who are not married live together in an intimate relationship, particularly an emotionally and/or sexually intimate one, on a long-term or permanent basis.

More broadly, the term cohabitation can mean any number of people living together.

Reasons for cohabitation

Today, cohabitation is a common pattern among people in the Western world. People may live together for a number of reasons. These may include wanting to test compatibility or to establish financial security before getting married. They might see cohabitation as a way of being single, though they don't consider themselves as single, but neither are they looking for a spouse. Also couples prefer to cohabitate because it is similar way of being married, but they don't have any legal commitment with their partners. It may also be because they are unable to legally marry, due to reasons such as same-sex, some interracial or interreligious marriages are not legal or permitted. Other reasons include living as a way for polygamists or polyamorists to avoid breaking the law, or as a way to avoid the higher income taxes paid by some two-income married couples (in the United States), negative effects on pension payments (among older people), or philosophical opposition to the institution of marriage (that is, seeing little difference between the commitment to live together and the commitment to marriage). Some individuals also may choose to cohabit because they see their relationships as being private and personal matters, and not to be controlled by political, religious, matriarchal or patriarchal institutions.

In the United States, there is an economic incentive for low income couples with children to cohabitate in the structure of the federal assistance programs. Unmarried couples can legally exclude one income from their applications for Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and the Head Start Program. The use of both incomes, which would be legally required if they were married, would in many cases reduce or eliminate the couple's benefits.

Some couples prefer cohabitation because it does not legally commit them for an extended period, and because it is easier to establish and dissolve without the legal costs often associated with a divorce. In some jurisdictions cohabitation can be viewed legally as common-law marriages, either after the duration of a specified period, or the birth of the couple's child, or if the couple consider and behave accordingly as husband and wife. (This helps provide the surviving partner a legal basis for inheriting the deceased's belongings in the event of the death of their cohabiting partner.

Opposition

In the Western world, a man and a woman who lived together without being married were once socially shunned and persecuted and, in some cases, prosecuted by law. In some jurisdictions, cohabitation was illegal until relatively recently. Other jurisdictions have created a common-law marriage status when two people of the opposite sex live together for a prescribed period of time. Most jurisdictions no longer prosecute this choice. Consent to be spouses of all persons involved is not required. Therefore, it is likely that future court challenges in Canada will use this Canadian case law to claim married persons may also civilly marry other persons without divorcing first.

Effect on marriage

Conflicting studies on the effect of cohabitation on marriage have been published.

Increases likelihood of divorce

A scientific survey, conducted by researchers at Denver University, of over 1,000 married men and women in the United States of America found those who moved in with a lover before engagement or marriage reported significantly lower quality marriages and a greater possibility of a separation than other couples. About 20 percent of those who cohabited before getting engaged had since suggested divorce - compared with only 12 percent of those who only moved in together after getting engaged and 10 percent who did not cohabit prior to marriage.

Psychologist Dr. Galena Rhoades said: "There might be a subset of people who live together before they got engaged who might have decided to get married really based on other things in their relationship - because they were already living together and less because they really wanted and had decided they wanted a future together. We think some couples who move in together without a clear commitment to marriage may wind up sliding into marriage partly because they are already cohabiting.". Many cohabiting couples may also end up getting married due to pressure from their parents.

No effect

A conflicting study, published by the National Center for Health Statistics, with a sample of 12,571 people, concludes that those "who live together before marriage and those who don't both have about the same chances of a successful union".

Cohabitation by region

Americas

In America in 2007, it is estimated that 16.4 million households were maintained by two opposite sex persons who said they were unmarried.

• In Mexico, 18.7% of couples were cohabiting as of 2005. Ley de sociedad de convivencia: the Spanish name for "Cohabitation Societies Law", legislation created on November 9, 2006, by the Legislation Assembly of Mexico City to establish legal rights and duties for all those cases where two people (due to either sexual, familial or friendly reasons) are living together.

• Cohabitation in the United States became common in the late 20th century. As of 2005, 4.85 million unmarried couples were living together, and as of 2002, about half of all women aged 15 to 44 had lived unmarried with a partner. Seven states still have anti-cohabitation laws on the books, but they are almost never enforced and are now believed to be unconstitutional since the legal decision Lawrence v. Texas in 2003.

• "Cohabition was almost impossible in the United States prior to the 1960s. Laws prevented unmarried couples from registering in hotels and it was very difficult for an unmarried couple to obtain a home mortgage. From 1960 to 1998, cohabition moved from disreputable and difficult to normal and convenient." PBS: Social disruptions

Asia

• In Bangladesh cohabitation after divorce is frequently punished by the salishi system of informal courts, especially in rural areas.

• Cohabitation in India had been taboo since British rule. However, this is no longer true in large cities, but is not often found in rural areas which are more conservative. Live-in relationships are legal in India. Recent Indian court rulings have ascribed some rights to long term cohabiting partners. Female live-in partners have economic rights under Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005 subject to following conditions as laid by Honourable Supreme Court of India in case of D. Velusamy v D. Patchaiammal:

(a) The couple must hold themselves out to society as being akin to spouses. (b) They must be of legal age to marry. (c) They must be otherwise qualified to enter into a legal marriage, including being unmarried. (d) They must have voluntarily cohabited and held themselves out to the world as being akin to spouses for a significant period of time.

• In Indonesia, an Islamic penal code proposed in 2005 would have made cohabitation punishable by up to two years in prison.

• In Japan, according to M. Iwasawa at the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, less than 3% of females between 25-29 are currently cohabiting, but more than 1 in 5 have had some experience of an unmarried partnership, including cohabitation. A more recent Iwasawa study has shown that there has been a recent emergence of non-marital cohabitation. Couples born in the 1950s cohort showed an incidence of cohabitation of 11.8%, where the 1960s and 1970s cohorts showed cohabitation rates of 30%, and 53.9% respectively. The split between urban and rural residence for people who had cohabited is indicates 68.8% were urban and 31.2% were rural.

• In the Philippines, around 2.4 million Filipinos were cohabiting as of 2004. The 2000 census placed the percentage of cohabiting couples at 19%. The majority of individuals are between the ages of 20-24. Poverty was often the main factor in decision to cohabit.

Europe

• In Bulgaria, cohabitation is very common; 53.4% of all children born in 2009 were into families of unmarried couples.

• Sweden, 56% of babies are born to people who are not married.

• France, 48% of babies are born to people who are not married.

• Britain, 42% of babies are born to people who are not married.

• In late 2005, 21% of families in Finland consisted of cohabitating couples (all age groups). Of couples with children, 18% were cohabitating. Of ages 18 and above in 2003, 13.4% were cohabitating. Generally, cohabitation amongst Finns is most common for people under 30. Legal obstacles for cohabitation were removed in 1926 in a reform of the Criminal Code, while the phenomenon was socially accepted much later on.
• In the UK, 25%^{[citation needed]}of children are now born to cohabiting parents.
• In France, 17.5% of couples were cohabiting as of 1999.

Middle East

• The cohabitation rate in Israel is less than 3% of all couples, compared to 8%, on average, in West European countries. As of 1994, the rate of premarital cohabitation in Israel was 25%.
• Cohabitation is illegal according to sharia law (for the countries that enforce it)

Aside from the law, cohabiting remains very much taboo across the region. Nevertheless, the issue of cohabitation of unmarried couples has featured in some Tunisian movies, such as Les Silences du Palais (1994)

Oceania

• In Australia, 22% of couples were cohabiting as of 2005.

• In New Zealand, 18.3% of couples were cohabiting as of 2001.

In America, in 2003, 22.5% of couples were cohabiting.

See also

• Alimony
• Family
  • Family law
• Child
• Interpersonal relationship and Intimate relationship
  • Divorce
  • Domestic partnership
  • Free union
  • Marriage
  • Pilegesh
• Marriage gap
• Living Apart Together

External links

• Cohabitation and Family Law in Australia
•  "Cohabitation". Encyclopedia Americana. 1920.