Cohabitation is now the modal path to marriage in the United States. Drawing on data from 115 in‐depth interviews with cohabitors from the working and lower middle classes, this paper explores how economics shape marital decision making. We find that cohabitors typically perceive financial issues as important for marriage, and we delineate several key themes. Whereas some social scientists speculate that cohabitors must think that marriage will change their lives in order to motivate marriage, our findings suggest that cohabitors believe marriage should occur once something has already changed—in this case, their financial status. Our results also imply that political and scientific discourse on financial problems as deterrents to marriage should be broadened beyond a focus on poor unmarried parents.

Almost all our knowledge about cohabitation in the United States rests on analysis of nationally representative, large‐scale surveys. We move beyond this work by drawing on 115 in‐depth interviews with a sample of young men and women with recent cohabitation experience. These data allow us to address two issues of central interest to family studies. First, we use our qualitative data to assess the measurement of cohabitation in surveys and the census. We find that current measurement strategies are probably underestimating cohabitation, and we may need to find new ways to measure cohabitation. Second, we employ qualitative findings to address issues relating to how we empirically model union formation. We find that the movement into cohabitation is not akin to marriage. It is often not a deliberate decision. Couples do not appear to be deciding between cohabitation and marriage; rather, their decision seems to center around whether to remain single or cohabit. These results have important implications for our analysis and understanding of cohabitation.

ࡗ Adolescent Well-Being in Cohabiting, Married, and Single-Parent Families Cohabitation is a family form that increasingly includes children. We use the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to assess the well-being of adolescents in cohabiting parent stepfamilies (N ϭ 13,231). Teens living with cohabiting stepparents often fare worse than teens living with two biological married parents. Adolescents living in cohabiting stepfamilies experience greater disadvantage than teens living in married stepfamilies. Most of these differences, however, are explained by socioeconomic circumstances. Teenagers living with single unmarried mothers are similar to teens living with cohabiting stepparents; exceptions include greater delinquency and lower grade point averages experienced by teens living with cohabiting stepparents. Yet mother's marital history explains these differences. Our results contribute to our understanding of cohabitation and debates about the importance of marriage for children.An extensive literature exists that examines the importance of family structure (defined by marital status) for child well-being. Marital status acts as an indicator of the potential number of caretakers and may imply certain characteristics or qualities of the child's family life. This emphasis on marital

Further efforts to understand contraceptive choice among adolescents should focus on relationship features. Research on the decision-making process surrounding contraceptive use may benefit from treating this as a partner decision and not just as a decision made by one member of the couple. Further research examining the qualities of the relationship may provide important clues for understanding adolescent contraceptive choice.

Studies of teen dating violence have focused heavily on family and peer influences, but little research has been conducted on the relationship contexts within which violence occurs. The present study explores specific features of adolescent romantic relationships associated with the perpetration of physical violence. Relying on personal interviews with a sample of 956 adolescents, results indicate that respondents who self-report violence perpetration are significantly more likely than their nonviolent counterparts to report higher levels of other problematic relationship dynamics and behaviors such as jealousy, verbal conflict, and cheating. However, we find no significant differences in levels of love, intimate self-disclosure, or perceived partner caring, and violent relationships are, on average, characterized by longer duration, more frequent contact, sexual intimacy and higher scores on the provision and receipt of instrumental support. Finally, violence is associated with the perception of a relatively less favorable power balance, particularly among male respondents. These findings complicate traditional views of the dynamics within violent relationships, add to our understanding of risk factors, and may also shed light on why some adolescents remain in physically abusive relationships. Keywords adolescent romantic relationships; gender; teen dating violencePrior research on teen dating violence (TDV) has documented the scope and seriousness of this public health problem (O'Leary et al., 2008;Zurbriggen, 2009). There is general agreement that violence within the context of intimate relationships is emotionally and physically costly (Silverman et al., 2001), and that such formative experiences during adolescence may be linked to later violence within adult relationships (Halpern et al., 2001;Henton et al., 1983;O'Leary and Slep, 2003). Research has also focused on the demographic patterning of violence within teen relationships (particularly the issue of gender disparities and symmetries (e.g., Halpern et al., 2001;Stets and Pirog-Good, 1987;Whitaker et al., 2007), and precursors (such as witnessing or experiencing violence within the family of origin (see DeMaris, 1990;Foshee et al. 2008;O'Keeffe et al., 1986;Wolfe et al., 2001)). Yet even though TDV necessarily occurs within a relationship context, research on the character and dynamics of violent relationships © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.Direct correspondence to Peggy C. Giordano, Department of Sociology, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH 43403 (pgiorda@bgsu.edu).. Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaime...