A ground-breaking new study of 289 pairs of male twins shows that it
is marriage itself, combined with pre-existing personality traits, which
explains why married men are less likely to engage in anti-social
behaviour than single men.
The findings of the study are likely to help answer a question asked
by researchers over a number of years, concerning why married men
display fewer qualities associated with anti-social behaviour, such as
criminality, lying, aggression, and lack of remorse than their single
counterparts.
Some researchers have argued that this was due to the fact that men
who married were less likely to display such characteristics in the
first place. This is called the ‘selection effect’.
Others held that
marriage itself contributed to the phenomenon. This can be called the
‘marriage effect’.
The research shows that men with fewer aggressive qualities were
indeed more likely to eventually end up married – which backs the
selection effect argument - but that among such men who did marry, their
previous bad behaviour often diminished, which backs the marriage
effect school of thought.
Study author Dr S. Alexandra Burt at Michigan State University said
that married men "are just not as antisocial to begin with," she said.
But she added that when men get married, “they get even less
antisocial.”
Dr Burt and her colleagues followed 289 pairs of male
twins for 12 years, between the ages of 17 and 29.
More than half of
the twins were identical, meaning they shared all of their genes - and,
largely, their childhood environment, as well, since both were raised in
the same household.
According to the research, men who eventually married during the
study period - about 60 per cent of them - showed less antisocial
behaviour at ages 17 and 20, suggesting that men with more of these
traits are less likely to get married in the first place.
Specifically,
they found that by the age of 29, unmarried men had an average of 1.3
antisocial behaviours, compared with 0.8 among married men.
However, among identical twins in which one was married and one
wasn't, the married twin had fewer antisocial behaviours after the union
than the unmarried twin.
Given that identical twins, with their similar genetics and childhood
environments, are likely to have the same antisocial tendencies, these
findings indicate that marriage helped weed out those bad behaviours.
The research didn't give many clues as to why men's behaviours might improve after marriage.
Dr Burt also said that it wasn't absolutely clear why men with more
anti-social behaviours may not marry in the first place, although she
acknowledged that such men are probably not the most eligible bachelors.
"You may not be looking to settle down with someone who's prone to
aggression, theft, and other things.” And for men with these
tendencies, marriage may not be so appealing, she added.
Whether the same trend is true in women is also not clear, Burt
noted, since women are less likely to have antisocial behaviours in the
first place.
The results, presented in the Archives of General Psychiatry, help
explain the consistent findings from other studies that men who are
married commit fewer crimes.
One recent study, for example, showed
marriage was associated with a 35 per cent reduction in crime.
Historically, studies have also found that married people as a group
tend to be healthier than singles — though recent research suggests the
health advantage of marriage may be fading.
Still, people with spouses
tend to live longer, be less depressed, and suffer less from heart
disease and stroke.
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