Examined meaning of informal unions among mainland Puerto Rican women. Compared characteristics of women in informal unions to those of single and married women; assessed whether Puerto Rican women defined their informal unions as nonmarital cohabitation or form of marriage; and examined predictors of women's definitions of informal unions. Found…

Tested Bott's (1957) hypothesis that the connectedness of social networks to which spouses belong influences the segregation of marital-role activities. Results from 100 Puerto Rican migrant spouse pairs and 100 pairs of their adult married children failed to confirm Bott's hypothesis. Network characteristics appeared to be influenced by sex;…

Examined egalitarian spouse roles in relation to marital satisfaction of wives among intergenerationally linked Puerto Rican families. Results revealed that, in each generation of wives, marital satisfaction was associated with egalitarian spouse roles. (Author/NB)

Used data from 200 maritally intact Puerto Rican families in New York City to examine the hypothesized linkage between heterogamy and low marital quality. Findings confirm the existence of homogamous patterns based on age, education, and adherence to cultural values, but do not support the hypothesis that heterogamous dissimilarities in such…

Examined Rodman's theory of resources in cultural context to understand decision-making patterns among spouses in intergenerationally linked Puerto Rican families in the United States. Data indicated husbands in the parent generation with higher socioeconomic achievements, reflecting socialization to modern values, had less power in decision…

Data from 2,033 mainland Puerto Rican women revealed that growing proportion of Puerto Rican children were born outside of formal/informal coresidential unions. Among children born into intact unions, increasing proportion are offspring of informal unions. Puerto Rican children face high risks of family disruption during childhood. (Author/NB)

Using the 1987-88 National Survey of Families and Households, this research examines normative beliefs about marriage and cohabitation among non-Latino whites, Mexican Americans, and mainland Puerto Ricans. Results indicate Mexican Americans tend to be more pronuptial than non-Latino whites. They evaluate marriage more positively relative to…