Cohabitation

The following are some highlights from a Christianity Today report.

In a 2007 edition of the New Oxford Review, Dr. A. Patrick Schneider II, who holds boards in family and geriatric medicine and runs a private practice in Lexington, Kentucky, did a statistical analysis of cohabitation in America, based on the findings of a number of academic resources. Here are five conclusions Schneider draws from his studies:

1. Relationships are unstable in cohabitation....one in ten survives five or more years.
2. Cohabiting women often end up with the responsibilities of marriage—particularly when it comes to caring for children—without the legal protection.
3. Cohabitation brings a greater risk of sexually transmitted diseases, because cohabiting men are four times more likely to be unfaithful than husbands.
4. Those who suffer most from cohabitation are the children.