[xzins]

It's always nice to see the methodology and all the numbers, but these extracted results aren't good:

Alabama and Arkansas have the second and third highest divorce rates in the U.S., at 13 per 1000 people per year while New Jersey and Massachusetts, more liberal states, are two of the lowest at 6 and 7 per 1000 people annually.

[Lee N. Field]

Divorce Rate Higher in Counties With More Conservative Protestants,

Maybe in other places, they just shack up. No marriage to get divorced from.

[The_Victor]

Alabama and Arkansas have the second and third highest divorce rates in the U.S., at 13 per 1000 people per year while New Jersey and Massachusetts, more liberal states, are two of the lowest at 6 and 7 per 1000 people annually.

If I'm reading this correctly, that is divorces per capita.

So, I'm calling BS on the whole study. If people don't get married, they can't get divorced. People in Alabama and Arkansas are simple more likely to get married, period. With a higher number of marriages you will naturally have a higher number of divorces. If you really want to look at the true state of marriage/divorce, the methodology needs to be divorces per marriage.

[bolobaby]

Divorce rate per 1000 PEOPLE is an irrelevant figure. Divorce rate per 1000 MARRIED COUPLES would be relevant.

Junk “science.”

[gusty]

One answer is something I have observed for decades in relation to the regions compared. As a lifelong resident of the Northeast, I have observed that despite the politics, people of this region live a very conservative private life even when they are liberal. Especially in the Boston, New York and Philadelphis suburbs. I am not speaking about the inner city. A lot of Northeast liberals will speak in public one way, but when it comes to their own family the social pathologies that they are tolerant of in speech are not tolerated for their own children. Parents are obsessed with raising super achievers in these parts, every bit as much as Asian parents are stereotyped. My sister in law was a army brat, and lived in Kansas and El Paso before finally settling in South Jersey. She was surprised that at her public HS in NJ there was less teenage shacking up and misbehavior than the other two locales. It was counter intuitive to what she expected.

Another reason for these statistics is staring everyone in the face, money. Money problems is one or two in the cause of divorce. The two states with the high rate are poorer than the two with the low rate.

[Salvation]

Interesting. I’ll read the thread later.