Marital Happiness and Inter-Racial Marriage: A Study in a Multi-Ethnic Community in Hawaii

Inter-racial marriages are often reported as less stable and less happy than intra-racial marriages, but the effect of race and culture is difficult to separate. This paper examines self-reported marital happiness among a sample of married couples in a multi-racial, multi-cultural but homoreligious community. Findings suggest that even after controlling religion and many other demographic variables, inter-racially married individuals report lower happiness than those in intraracial unions, especially women. When couples are used as unit of analysis and husband and wife’s responses are controlled for each other, wives’ happiness is significantly affected by interracial marriage. Husbands’ happiness is not related to their type of marriage.