The Huffington Post published some year-end information recently that it termed “some of the most interesting facts published about divorce in 2013.”
We agree with the assessment and pass along bits and pieces of the data that we think might be of interest to our readers in Georgia and elsewhere. Readers should take note that, while some of the forthcoming information seems well grounded in studies of real substance, a bit of what follows might more reasonably be termed as anecdotal and even tongue-in-cheek.
Like this, for instance. A Depauw University psychology professor has written a book in which he posits that a person’s long-ago pictures can present meaningful clues regarding the outcome of their future relationships. Specifically, his research reveals that persons who were clearly happy in childhood photos are more likely later in life to have viable and enduring marriages than persons who, as noted in the article discussing his study, “smiled weakly, or not at all.”
There might of course be some validity to that. On the other hand, you might not want to bet the farm on those findings; we all had bad days in our youth.
A report from Bowling Green State University that focuses on women and divorce is unquestionably grounded in solid research. The school’s National Center for Marriage and Family Research concludes this: American women are divorcing at a rate nowadays that is more than 15 times higher than it was a near-century ago. Additionally, women today are remarrying less often than they did in past generations.
A bit of positive news potentially accompanies divorce in recent study findings concluding that some persons who have experienced past adversity — which divorce is, of course, for many people — have “an elevated capacity for savoring” in the present.
That hardly seems disputable for any person who has just ended a bad marriage.
Source: Huffington Post, “Research findings from 2013 offer insight into why couples split — and what happens after,” Taryn Hillin, Dec. 30, 2013
