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Factors related to marital adjustment of married college students at Iowa State University PDF

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Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Retrospective Theses and Dissertations Dissertations 1969 Factors related to marital adjustment of married college students at Iowa State University Sharon June Price Iowa State University Follow this and additional works at:https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/rtd Part of theFamily, Life Course, and Society Commons Recommended Citation Price, Sharon June, "Factors related to marital adjustment of married college students at Iowa State University " (1969).Retrospective Theses and Dissertations. 4681. https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/rtd/4681 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Dissertations at Iowa State University Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Retrospective Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Iowa State University Digital Repository. For more information, please [email protected]. This dissertation has been microfihned exactly as received 69-15,639 PRICE, Sharon June, 1938- FACTORS RELATED TO MARITAL ADJUSTMENT OF MARRIED COLLEGE STUDENTS AT IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY. Iowa State University, Ph.D., 1969 Sociology, family University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan FACTORS RELATED TO MARITAL ADJUSTMENT OF MARRIED COLLEGE STUDENTS AT IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY by Sharon June Price A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Partial Fulfillment of The Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Major Subject: Sociology Approved : Signature was redacted for privacy. In Char^ of Major Work Signature was redacted for privacy. real? of Major Department Signature was redacted for privacy. an of Graduate College Iowa State University Ame s, Iowa 1969 ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page INTRODUCTION 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE 8 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 9 METHODS AND PROCEDURES 150 ANALYSIS OF DATA AND FINDINGS 249 DISCUSSION 279 SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH 290 SUMMARY 293 BIBLIOGRAPHY 297 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 310 APPENDIX A 311 APPENDIX B 319 APPENDIX C 364 1 INTRODUCTION The past three decades have witnessed a number of major changes in the traditional concept of the college student. A striking illustration of these changes can be seen in the vast increase in the proportion of married students on college and university campuses. Two or three decades ago there was widespread skepticism, and cases of outright opposition relative to the student's ability to successfully handle education-plus-marriage and advisability of allowing students to attempt id. Many administrators were convinced an appreciable proportion of married students, particularly undergraduate students, would constitute a disrupting influence. In some schools the skepticism evolved into discrimination; married students were not permitted to participate in school-sponsored athletic events, live in dormitories, fraternity or sorority houses, or to hold offices in campus extracurricular organizations. Today, much of this earlier resistance to campus marriages has dis­ appeared. Many present-day administrators not only hold the opinion that married students have the ability to successfully handle education-plus- marriage, but in many cases married students are viewed as contributing to campus stability. Today, over 6,000,000 students are enrolled in college. Approximately 25 percent of this number are married and living with their spouses. In­ cluded in this percentage is 6 percent of the female and 26 percent of the male student population. This percentage does not include students who are married but whose spouses are absent, such as in the military service. In 1963, of those students attending full time (12 or more hours during the 2 average school week), 12 percent were married (15 percent of the males and 6 percent of the females). In the same year, of those students enrolled part-time (taking fewer than 12 hour6 during the average school week), al­ most 55 percent were married including 59 percent of the male and 47 percent of the female student population (12, p. 457). Frequently, the assumption is made that campus marriage is merely young marriage that happens to occur in a college milieu. It is further assumed that college marriages could lead to expectations which may be appropriate for marriage outside the college or university environment, but are not appropriate for college marriages. These assumptions are question­ able in two ways: (1) It is true that many campus marriages are young mar­ riages. However, there is also wide variation in the age of married college students; (2) There is also the possibility that college marriage is a dif­ ferent type of marriage than what is conceived as the traditional marriage, as it entails factors relatively unknown to marriages outside this atmos­ phere. This presents a special need for research which will lead to the development of insights into this particular population of married couples. Several authors, including Petersen (149), Kirkendall (95), and Bowman (12), state the major problem areas confronting married college students include: (1) personal growth within tihe marriage relationship; (2) family planning; (3) coping with stress factors found in combining marriage and college life; and (4) overall marital adjustment. Christensen and Philbrick (36) reported 50 to 75 percent of all chil­ dren born to college couples were unplanned, thus requiring adjustments in marriage and often in schooling. Davis (49), as a result of studying 2,842 graduate students in 25 educational institutions, reported the proportion 3 of fathers working full time was three times that of non-fathers. LeMasters (109) reported a strong relationship between the presence of unplanned children and maladjustment in marriage among urban couples. For some married students the circumstances may warrant beginning their family. However, if the phenomenon of the birth of unplanned children in college marriages is frequent enough and stressful enough, it requires more detailed study. Studies concerning the frequency of the unplanned child in college marriages were conducted before the wide distribution and use of improved contraceptives, such as the "pill" and the "coil" (lUD), Therefore, there exists today the possibility of a lesser degree of unplanned pregnancies among married college students and therefore the possibility of improvement in the area of family planning. However, the birth of the first child, planned or unplanned, has been viewed as a crisis in the married lives of parents (109). Approximately 60 percent of all married students are parents. Therefore, the influence of parenthood on marital adjustment among married college students warrants further investigation. Simultaneous financing of marriage and college is a major stress for most married students. Landis (107) states finances is the most prevalent problem in college marriages. Finances could confront the couple with a need for prolonged dependency on parents, indebtedness, and a reversal of the traditional male and female roles. These stress factors come at a time when the couple is striving to gain independence and identify with role patterns of husband and wife. Stress related to maintaining adequate finan­ cial support could facilitate adjustment or be a disruptive factor, depend­ ing on how it is handled. Whereas, twenty-five years ago parental subsidy 4 of a married college student was negligible, today there is growing attitude of the appropriateness of parental support (150, 39). However, both parents and students report conflict in their attitudes regarding this cultural change (150), Research is needed that will indicate the manner and extent to which the modification of these attitudes may be taking place. There have been a number of studies concerned with campus marriages. However, there are several reasons for continuing research in this area. Many of these earlier studies failed to adequately control for relevant variables which differentiated subgroups within the married student popula­ tion, i.e., graduate and undergraduate students, employed and nonemployed wives, couples in which both spouses were students, and in which only one spouse was a student. Also, these earlier studies vary greatly in their sampling procedures. A second major reason for continued research in this area is the fact that past research dealing with married college students was conducted in the latter 1940's and 1950's. The married student population of these two decades was predominantly a veteran's group (World War II and Korean War), older, and government financed. Today, the married college student popula­ tion is generally viewed as a younger group and dependent on parents, spouses, loan funds, scholarships, and employment for financial support. Therefore, much of the research findings reported in the 1940's and 1950's are possibly not applicable to the married college student of today. The third major reason for research dealing with the married college student is that the majority of the former studies have been purely descrip­ tive in purpose and strongly demographic in nature. Past research offers little insight into the problems of the marriage of this population. The 5 studies which have dealt with factors affecting the marital adjustment of married college students and/or spouses have not investigated the marital adjustment of the individual spouses. Rather, the former studies which in­ vestigated marital adjustment primarily investigated factors related to the combined degree of marital adjustment achieved by the couple. Thus, con­ sidering the vast number of married college students and the additional stress of securing a college education while also adjusting in marriage, it appears that factual information concerning marital adjustment of each spouse in this particular population is much needed. A very important factor in marriage is the satisfaction which the spouses derive from their life together. Marital satisfaction takes on in­ creased importance when factors such as additional stress is added to the marriage, or the controlling forces in society keeping marriages together are weakened. Such a weakening in social control is manifested at the present time in more permissive divorce laws and fewer negative sanctions in everyday life concerning divorce. Under these conditions marital satis­ faction is even more important for the continuation of a marriage. Marital satisfaction is assumed to be derived from marital adjustment (sometimes referred to as success, satisfaction, happiness). The condi­ tions under which marital adjustment occurs have been studied in a number of investigations. However, very little empirical research has been con­ ducted in this area with married college students. Most of the investigations in the area of marital adjustment are so- called prediction studies, i.e., they deal with the problem of how well marital adjustment can be predicted from knowledge of various factors re­ lated to the marriage. These factors include those which occur before the 6 marriage takes place, at an earlier time in the marriage, or at the same time the marital adjustment is observed. This study is also a prediction study, dealing with marital adjustment and the variables believed related to adjustment. This study will examine factors which are related to marital adjust­ ment among married college students and/or spouses at Iowa State University. More specifically, it will attempt to ascertain the relationship between the characteristics and attitudes of married college students and/or spouses at Iowa State University and the degree of marital adjustment which the individual spouses have achieved. It is assumed there exists certain var­ iables in college marriages, in addition to variables which exist in any marriage, which contribute to marital adjustment. This study seeks to accomplish the following objectives: 1. To gain insight into the characteristics of the married col­ lege students and/or spouses at Iowa State University. 2. To determine the differential effect, if any, between selected variables and the degree of marital adjustment achieved by the individual spouses. 3. To determine the influence of the wife being a student and/or employed on the degree of marital adjustment achieved by the individual spouses. The scope of this study will be confined to an examination of the characteristics of the married college students and their spouses at Iowa State University. These students were enrolled at Iowa State University during the school year 1967-1968. In addition, they were enrolled during the Summer Session, 1968, and/or were pre-registered for Fall Quarter, 1968.

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Thus, within the framework of marriage is a process of interaction In the case of an actor not having an appropriate identity he could choose from his .. drinking; desertion; relatives; the triangle of drinking, gambling, and.
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