Factors in the Distribution of Success in Marriage

The present article attempts to explain the marked negative skewness found in the distribution of success in marriage of a sample of 252 individuals, as reported in an earlier article. Age, income, education, and absence of children must be discarded as explanatory factors of success in marriage in the present sample. A negatively skewed curve is probably normal for distribution of marital satisfaction, but this skewness is exaggerated in the present study by the instrument used and by psychological selective factors. The Appendix suggests that a periodic relationship may obtain between number of years' duration of marriage and marital satisfaction; that a parabolic relationship exists between the difference in age of the spouses and marital satisfaction; that a negative relationship may exist between age of men at marriage and their marital satisfaction; and that the first child is more of a disturbing factor with men than the second child.