Relationships (Outline)
Types Genetic or adoptive Kinship Family Parent father mother Grandparent Sibling Cousin By marriage Spouse Husband Wife Open marriage Polygamy Polyandry Polygyny Group marriage Mixed-orientation Partner(s) Significant other Boyfriend Girlfriend Cohabitation Same-sex Life partner Friendship (romantic / cross-sex / zone) Intimate and sexual Casual Monogamy Non-monogamy Mutual monogamy Polyamory Polyfidelity Cicisbeo Concubinage Courtesan Mistress
Activities Bonding Courtship Dating Engagement Bachelor's Day Mating Meet market Romance Singles event Wedding
Endings Breakup Legal/marital separation Annulment Divorce Widowhood
Emotions and feelings Affinity Attachment Intimacy Jealousy Limerence Love Platonic Unconditional Passion Sexuality
Practices Bride price dower dowry service Hypergamy Infidelity Sexual activity Transgression Repression
Abuse Child Dating Domestic Elderly Narcissistic parent Power and control Stalking
v t e

Cohabitation is an arrangement where people who are not married, usually couples, live together. They are often involved in a romantic or sexually intimate relationship on a long-term or permanent basis. Such arrangements have become increasingly common in Western countries since the late 20th century, being led by changing social views, especially regarding marriage, gender roles and religion.

More broadly, the term cohabitation can mean any number of people living together. To "cohabit", in a broad sense, means to "coexist".^[1] The origin of the term comes from the mid 16th century, from the Latin cohabitare, from co- 'together' + habitare 'dwell'.^[1]

Social changes leading to increase

Today, cohabitation is a common pattern among people in the Western world.

In Europe, the Scandinavian countries have been the first to start this leading trend, although many countries have since followed.^[3] Mediterranean Europe has traditionally been very conservative, with religion playing a strong role. Until the mid-1990s, cohabitation levels remained low in this region, but have since increased;^[4] for example, in Portugal, the majority of children have been born of unwed parents since 2015, constituting 60% of the total in 2021.^[5]

In the United States, during the past few decades, there has been an increase in unmarried couples cohabiting.^[6] Historically, many Western countries have been influenced by Christian doctrines on sex, which opposes unmarried cohabitation. As social norms have changed, such beliefs have become less widely held by the population and some Christian denominations today view cohabitation as a precursor to marriage.^[7] Pope Francis has married a cohabiting couple who had children,^[8] while former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams^[9] and the Archbishop of York John Sentamu have expressed tolerance of cohabitation.^[10]

In recent decades, high rates of participation of women in the workforce and the widespread availability of highly effective long acting reversible contraceptives^[11] has led to women making individual choices over their reproduction with decreased reliance on male partners for financial stability. All these changes favored living arrangement alternatives to marriage.^[12]

In Central and Eastern Europe, during the late 1980s and early 1990s, there were major political changes, such as the fall of Communist governments. These societies entered a new era of increased social freedom, less rigid rules, and less authoritarian governments. They interacted with Western Europe and some became members of the European Union. As a result, the patterns of family life have started to change: marriage rates have declined, and marriage was postponed to a later age. Cohabitation and births to unmarried mothers increased, and in some countries the increase was very quick.^[13]

The deinstitutionalization of marriage refers to the weakening of the social and legal norms that regulate peoples' behavior in regard to marriage.^[14] The rise in cohabitation is part of other major social changes such as: higher divorce rate, older age at first marriage and childbearing, and more births outside marriage. Factors such as secularization, increased participation of women in the labor force, changing in the meaning of marriage, risk reduction, individualism, and changing views on sexuality have been cited as contributing to these social changes.^[15] There has also been a change in modern sexual ethics, with a focus on consent, rather than marital status (i.e. decriminalization of adultery and fornication; criminalization of marital rape), reflecting new concepts about the role and purpose of sexual interaction, and new conceptualizations of female sexuality and of self-determination.^[16] There have been objections against the legal and social regulation of female sexuality; with such regulations being often seen as violations of women's rights.^[a] In addition, some individuals may feel that marriage is unnecessary or outdated, leading to couples not formalizing their relation.^[18] For instance, in the European Values Study (EVS) of 2008, the percentage of respondents who agreed with the assertion that "Marriage is an outdated institution" was 37.5% in Luxembourg, 35.4% in France, 34.3% in Belgium, 31.2% in Spain, 30.5% in Austria, 29.2% in Germany, 27.7% in Switzerland, 27.2% in Bulgaria, 27.0% in the Netherlands, 25.0% in Slovenia.^[19]

The fact that many couples choose to live together without formalizing their relation is also recognized by the European Union. A 2004 directive forbids EU members from denying entry or residence of partners "with whom the Union citizen has a durable relationship, duly attested."^[20]

Reasons for cohabitation in the United States

Today, cohabitation in the United States is often a part of the dating process.^[21] In fact, "cohabitation is increasingly becoming the first coresidential union formed among young adults".^[22] In 1996, more than two-thirds of married couples in the US said that they lived together before getting married.^[23] "In 1994, there were 3.7 million cohabiting couples in the United States."^[24] This is a major increase from a few decades ago. According to Dr. Galena Rhoades, "Before 1970, living together outside marriage was uncommon, but by the late 1990s at least 50% to 60% of couples lived together premaritally."^[25]

People may live together for a number of reasons. Cohabitants could live together to save money, because of the convenience of living with another, or a need to find housing.^[21] Lower income individuals facing financial uncertainty may delay or avoid marriage, not only because of the difficulty of paying for a wedding^[26] but also because of fear of financial hardship if a marriage were to end in divorce.^[27]

When given a survey of the reasons why they cohabit, most couples listed reasons such as spending more time together, convenience-based reasons, and testing their relationships, while few gave the reason that they do not believe in marriage.^[28] The extremely high costs of housing and tight budgets of today's economy are also factors that can lead a couple to cohabitation.^[23]

Today sixty percent of all marriages are preceded by a period of cohabitation.^[29] Researchers suggest that couples live together as a way of trying out marriage to test compatibility with their partners, while still having the option of ending the relationship without legal implications.^[30] In 1996, "More than three-quarters of all cohabitors report plans to marry their partners, which implies that most of them viewed cohabitation as a prelude to marriage."^[24] Cohabitation shares many qualities with marriage, often couples who are cohabiting share a residence, personal resources, exclude intimate relations with others and, in more than 10% of cohabiting couples, have children.^[24] "Many young adults believe cohabitation is a good way to test their relationships prior to marriage."^[28] Couples who have plans to marry before moving in together or who are engaged before cohabiting typically marry within two years of living together.^[31] The state of cohabitation of a couple often ends either in marriage or in break-up; according to a 1996 study about 10% of cohabiting unions remained in this state more than five years.^[24] According to a survey done by The National Center for Health Statistics, "over half of marriages from 1990-1994 among women began as cohabitation."^[22] Zdroj:https://en.wikipedia.org?pojem=Cohabit
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