Attitudes toward marriage and premarital sexual activity of college freshmen

In order to explore the relationship between attitudes toward marriage and premarital sexual activity, 143 male and 198 female college freshmen were administered a general information questionnaire and a modified version of Hill's (1951) Favorableness of Attitudes Toward Marriage Scale. It was found that females had more favorable attitudes toward marriage than did males. It was also found that virgins had more favorable attitudes toward marriage than nonvirgins who had multiple sex partners. Scores for nonvirgins who had only one sex partner fell between those for virgins and nonvirgins who had multiple sex partners. The interaction of gender and group status (i.e., virgins, nonvirgins with only one partner, and nonvirgins with multiple partners) was not significant.