The marriage myth: why tying the knot doesn’t reduce depression symptoms in everyone.
Getting married is linked to lower depression symptoms in some people.
The link is strongest in households where the total income is below $60,000.
For couples earning more than this, marriage does not provide the same benefits to mental health.
In fact, at higher levels of income, people who have never married have fewer symptoms of depression.
The reason is probably that at lower incomes, both partners can pool their resources, enjoy more financial security and so worry less.
Dr Ben Lennox Kail, the study’s first author, said:
“We looked at the interrelationships between marriage, income and depression, and what we found is that the benefit of marriage on depression is really for people with average or lower levels of income.
Specifically, people who are married and earning less than $60,000 a year in total household income experience fewer symptoms of depression.
But above that, marriage is not associated with the same kind of reduction in symptoms of depression.”
Financial security matters
The findings support a theory called the marital resource model.
This is the idea that the physical and psychological benefits of marriage are partly down to the pooling of resources.
Dr Kail said:
“For people who are earning above $60,000, they don’t get this bump because they already have enough resources.
About 50 percent of the benefit these households earning less than $60,000 per year get from marriage is an increased sense of financial security and self-efficacy, which is probably from the pooling of resources.
Also, it’s interesting to note, at the highest levels of income, the never married fare better in terms of depression than the married.
They have fewer symptoms of depression than married people.
All of these are subclinical levels of depression, meaning the disease is not severe enough to be clinically referred to as depression, but can nevertheless impact your health and happiness.”
The study was published in the journal Social Science Research (Carlson & Kail, 2018).
