Study: These Days, a Third of Marriages Begin With a Hookup

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If only you had this research in college, amiright?

New numbers in a recent study showed that 32 percent of the marriages being looked at had begun with what one might call a hookup. (Or at least, it had begun with what the now-married people vaguely refer to as a hookup, which we can only assume means it was not an overly meaningful first date during which the stars aligned and they Lady-and-the-Tramped some spaghetti as fireworks went off in the background.)

Researchers at the University of Virginia, who recently produced the National Marriage Report, kept up with 1,000 couples in relationships for five years, and 418 of those couples got married. (Remember our pool that determined that couples who had bigger weddings had happier marriages?) For a third of those marriages, the relationship had started with a hookup—and science also found that that third experienced a lower quality of marriage. (Score one for Lady-and-the-Trampers.)

It sounds like researchers are guessing that maybe couples who did that just kinda woke up the next morning, looked at their bed partner, shrugged their shoulders, said to themselves, Yeah, okay—stuck with it, and voila, one day they were married. But either way, they seem to feel that as long as these formerly loosey-goosey couples “adopt a deciding mindset going forward,” they shouldn’t end up back in that bar cruising for a new hookup anytime soon.

RELATED: Study: Couples Who Had Bigger Weddings Have Happier Marriages 

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