Examining Status Discrepant Marriages and Marital Quality at the Intersections of Gender, Race, and Class

Abstract

Purpose – This study examined the impact of educational differences between married women and men on marital quality at the intersections of gender, race, and class.Methodology/approach – Guided by an intersectional perspective we analyzed data for 4,835 black and white married couples from the National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH; 1987–1988). Dyadic multigroup models were estimated using structural equation modeling to examine how status differences affected four latent dimensions of marital quality: happiness, stability, perceived fairness, and disagreement.Findings – Our findings highlight how multiple dimensions of marital quality vary according to intersections of gender, race, and class, and reveal how these intersections moderate the impact of status on marital quality.Research limitations/implications – To our knowledge, the NSFH is the most up-to-date, nationally representative dataset available with couple-level data; however, the data were collected in the late 1980s and are insufficient for extending our analysis to other race-ethnic groups. Our findings demonstrate a strong need for more comprehensive contemporary data collection that has adequate numbers of respondents/couples at the intersections of gender, race, and class to facilitate further quantitative studies using an intersectional perspective.Originality/value – Our study is innovative in using education, an arena where women are currently outpacing men, as an indicator of status, and in embracing an intersectional perspective. By doing so we advance literature on status discrepant marriages, and contribute to the fields of gender and family studies which seek to understand how the changing roles of women may be affecting marital quality.

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