Well-Being

Married people and their children are happier
and have better mental health

Married people are twice as likely to be "happy" with life and less than half as likely to be "not too happy" compared to either single, cohabiting, separated, divorced or widowed people (Waite & Gallagher, 2000)

Mental health improves consistently and substantially after marriage and deteriorates substantially after divorce or separation. These are effects of marriage and divorce and not because healthy people marry and unhealthy
people divorce (Marks & Lambert, 1998, Horwitz et al, 1996)

Children in single parent households are twice as likely to be unhappy, have low self-esteem, or have mental health problems, even after taking demographic factors into account (Cockett & Tripp, 1994; Melzer & al, 2000)