Why Parents of Girls Divorce More

Psychology Today
August 29, 2010

Yes, it's true. In generation after generation across many countries, parents of girls divorce more than do parents of boys.

As Steven E. Landsburg put it in his Oct 2003 article for Slate magazine, "All over the world, boys hold marriages together, and girls break them up."

Economists Gordon Dahl (at the University of Rochester) and Enrico Moretti (at UCLA) discovered the following facts in 2003: In the United States, the parents of a girl are nearly 5 percent more likely to divorce than the parents of a boy. The parents of three girls are close to 10 percent more likely to divorce than the parents of three boys.

Not only do parents of daughters divorce more, but divorced women with daughters are substantially less likely to remarry than divorced women with sons. Landsburg suggested that "daughters are a liability in the market for a husband. Not only do daughters lower the probability of remarriage; they also lower the probability that a second marriage, if it does occur, will succeed."

Perhaps most incredible are Dahl and Moretti's findings from unmarried couples who are expecting a child. If the couple is expecting a boy, they are more likely to get married. Landsburg interpreted this fact in the following way, "Apparently, for unmarried fathers, the prospect of living with a wife and a son is more alluring than the prospect of living with a wife and a daughter."

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