@article{Hargens_40_52,
author = {Hargens, Lowell},
title={{Incidence of first-marriage divorce among women in the 1979 panel of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth}},
journal = {Demographic Research},
volume = {40},
number = {52},
pages = {1529--1536},
doi = {10.4054/DemRes.2019.40.52},
year = {2019},
abstract = {Objective: This study seeks to determine whether the likelihood of first-marriage divorce among a cohort of women who have been adults during the years of the US 'divorce plateau' matches the level implied by period rates of first-marriage divorce during those years. 

Methods: I use marital histories for women in the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY79) to examine the current status of their first marriages and also carry out a survival analysis that takes into account right censoring and the competing risks of death and widowhood. 

Results: It is likely that at least half of the first marriages of the women in the NLSY79 sample have already ended in divorce, a level notably higher than those implied by analyses based on period rates. 

Contribution: This is the first study to examine the marital histories of a cohort US women who are now in their late 50s and the first to show a level of first-marriage divorce exceeding 50%. It also suggests that the pattern of change in US age-specific divorce rates over that past four decades accounts for the higher than expected level of first-marriage divorce shown by the NLSY79 women. },
URL = {https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol40/52/},
eprint = {https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol40/52/40-52.pdf}
}