Age Heterogamy in Marriage

This paper examines age-heterogamous marriages. We test the notion that such marriages are most prevalent among the upper classes, and the belief that they exhibit poorer marital quality than age-similar unions. The first expectation was not supported: age-discrepant unions are clearly more prevalent among lower classes. Second, the analysis yielded no significant differences in marital quality among couples from various age-dissimilar categories. The findings contradict conventional wisdom and suggest the need to re-examine popular stereotypes surrounding age heterogamy in mate selection.