Related Experiment Video
Updated: Dec 22, 2025

Validation of a Psychosocial Intervention on Body Image in Older People: An Experimental Design
Published on: May 31, 2021
Marriage Advantage in Subjective Well-Being: Causal Effect or Unmeasured Heterogeneity?
1Department of Sociology, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio, USA.
Abstract:
I investigate whether the marriage advantage in subjective well-being is a true protective effect vs. being attributable to self-selection into (or out of) marriage based on pre-existing mental health. I utilize 1,240 respondents from the GSS panel, a three-wave longitudinal survey collected from 2010-2014. I use a pseudo-treatment approach to informally test for the presence of self-selection. This is followed by a fixed-effect regression analysis to eliminate its influence when estimating the marriage effect. Results support the existence of self-selection: the currently married who in later waves will be exiting marriage are already more distressed than other married respondents in wave 1. And the currently not married who in later waves will be entering marriage are not more distressed in wave 1 than those remaining continuously married. A protective effect is also supported: at any given time, net of self-selection, the currently married are less distressed than the unmarried.
More Related Videos
08:24The Joint Effect of Social Comparison and Social Distance on Evaluation of Intertemporal Choice Outcomes in Event-related Potential Studies
Published on: August 25, 2023
08:27Applying an eMASS Customization Program as a Research Tool to Evaluate Consumer Benefits
Published on: September 27, 2019
Related Concept Videos
Close Relationships and Culture
Relationship Formation
Social Relationships and Well-Being
Traits, Mood, and Subjective Wellbeing
Neuroticism and...
Desirable Characteristics in Others
Factors Influencing Attraction III: Similarity