Racial Intermarriage and Divorce in the United States

Vincent K. Fu, University of Utah
Nicholas H. Wolfinger, University of Utah

In recent decades scholars have devoted substantial attention to racial and ethnic intermarriage in the United States. Although increases in intermarriage have been celebrated as evidence that racial and ethnic boundaries are weakening, relatively little research has investigated sequelae of intermarriage to determine if this interpretation is justified. If interracial couples marry only to rapidly divorce, this calls into question conclusions drawn from observed increases in intermarriage. This study analyzes data from the 1995 and 2002 Cycles of the National Survey of Family Growth to investigate marital disruption differences between interracial and same-race couples. We will provide basic descriptive statistics on the divorce rates of same-race and interracial couples and then model disruption to estimate the effect of interracial marriage.