Common Causes of Divorce

Several studies exploring why couples divorce tend to concentrate on lists of possible causes of divorce: researchers often ask respondents to list their reasons for divorce, or to rank a list of events in order of importance. During the sixties, the first major study of divorce reasons found that wives cited twice as many complaints as husbands, and were far more likely to complain of physical abuse, financial problems, drinking, and verbal abuse; husbands were more likely to cite in-law trouble and sexual incompatibility. Results varied by socioeconomic status: lower-status couples seemed more concerned with problem behaviors, while middle-class couples concentrated on emotional issues.

Over time, divorce trends reflected a decline in economic difficulties and problem behaviors as a cause of divorce, offset by an increase in the importance of sexual and emotional incompatibility. In a 1985 study, the top reasons selected by both genders were communication problems, basic unhappiness, and incompatibility. Men and women tended to orient on different issues, however: the top factors for men seemed externally-oriented, while the women’s tended to be relationship-oriented.

Causes of Divorce – Four Major Reasons

Subsequent research sorted divorce causes into four (4) major reasons:

1) “individual” reasons, which arise from personal expectations or beliefs of either partner;

2) “dyadic” reasons, rooted in the relationship between the two partners;

3) “cicumstantial” reasons, connected to external chance events (e.g., sickness);

4) “network-nonromantic” reasons, emanating from the couple’s interactions with others, such as family or friends; and “network-romantic” reasons, which require no explanation. Types of reasons tended to be related to divorce trajectories. For example, “rapid” dissolutions, proceeding quickly from diagnosis to divorce, were associated with more individual or network-romantic reasons and fewer dyadic ones, while “extended” dissolutions were associated with more network-nonromantic reasons.

One of the assigned class readings found that women in the research literature cited more overall reasons for divorce than men. Women mentioned a large variety of dyadic and social network reasons, while men tended to focus on dyadic sexual problems, outside sexual affairs, and external influences. You may remember that partners also tended to disagree on certain reasons for divorce.

1. Lack of communication

Lack of communication is one of the leading causes of divorce. A marriage is on the rocks when the lines of communication fail. You can’t have an effective relationship if either one of you won’t discuss your feelings, can’t talk about your mutual or personal issues, will keep your resentments simmering under wraps, and expect your partner to guess what the whole problem is about.

2. Couples do not discuss their expectations

Divorces often happen because people rarely discuss their expectations in detail prior to marriage, are less willing to work on their marriages afterwards, and would like quick solutions rather than having to resolve issues. People have gotten divorced for trivial reasons like snoring.

3. Comers from divorced homes

People who come from divorced homes are more likely to get divorced than people who come from happily married households. Divorce seems less like a big deal if you have seen your parents go through with it. People who get married between the ages of 23-27 are more likely to stay together than people who get married in their teens. People who cohabit before marriage have higher rates of divorce than people who didn’t cohabit before marriage.

4. Couple’s relationship problems and issues

In many cases, quite a few of the problems that cause divorce have existed in the couple’s relationship long before they got married. The problems were either not acknowledged or were ignored in the fond hope that marriage might offer a miraculous panacea. And, guess what, it doesn’t. Nobody can make you feel better about yourself and you can’t change and save anybody. As someone wise once said, it takes two wholes to make a marriage, not two halves.

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