 from the research on mate selection. Contrary to popular opinion, the relationship between love and marriage is not well understood.
As the family system changes in American society, so too the direction of research on mate selection shifts. As more couples delay first marriage, examination of courtship cohabitation becomes more salient. Future studies of courtship cohabitation will most likely examine the association between increasing rates of cohabitation and decreasing rates of marriage. On the individual level, the effects of the cohabitation experience on the decision to marry also warrant attention.
Research is just beginning on the mate selection process of remarriage (Bulcroft et al. 1989; Rodgers and Conrad 1986; Spanier and Glick 1980). While some factors that predict first marriage may remain constant in remarriage, such as endogamy and propinquity, other factors may come into play in remarriage. For example, age homogeneity may be less of a factor in remarriage since the pool of eligible mates is impacted by sex ratio imbalance. The exchange relationship in the mate selection process also differs in remarriage, since presence of children, prior marital history, and the economic liabilities of child support and alimony bring new dimensions to considerations of remarriage. Of particular interest are barriers to remarriage in the middle and later years of the life cycle, such that cohabitation or serious dating may offer more long-term rewards to the couple than legal marriage might provide. Thus, the strong profamilial norms that encourage the younger members of society to marry dissipate at mid and later life. Low rates of remarriage for individuals over the age of 50, in part, indicate that societal pressure to marry is greatly reduced.
Last, it has generally been assumed that homogamy of background characteristics leads to similarity of values, shared marital role expectations, rapport, and intimacy in the process of mate selection. But due to changing gender role expectations, this assumption may no longer be valid. As a result, more attention needs to be given to the process of role negotiation as part of the mate selection process.
In summary, studies of mate selection began with understanding the correlates of mate selection. Social scientists began by studying demographic data on homogamy in religion, social class, age, and other factors as these variables related to who married whom. For a brief period in the 1960s through the early 1980s, attention was turned to theories and data that examined the process of mate selection. Current research in the 1990s has not abandoned the study of the correlates and theories of mate selection, but as the nature of the family system changes, researchers have begun to consider that the generalizability of theories and findings may be limited when a researcher is trying to explain mate selection at a point later than young adulthood. Recent studies on the courtship processes of divorced (O’Flaherty and Workman 1988) and later life mate selection (Veevers 1988) point to the future focus of theories and research on mate selection processes.
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