Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States
Intermarriage plays a key role in stratification systems. Spousal resemblance reinforces social boundaries within and across generations, and the rules of intermarriage govern the ways that social mobility may occur. We examine intermarriage across social origin and education boundaries in the Unite...
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Society for Sociological Science
2016-11-01
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doaj-2f959f1322a840ddbc1ca397d3524d952020-11-24T23:16:21ZengSociety for Sociological ScienceSociological Science2330-66962330-66962016-11-013441003102710.15195/v3.a443798Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United StatesChristine R. Schwartz0Zhen Zeng1Yu Xie2 University of Wisconsin-Madison U.S. Department of Justice Princeton University Intermarriage plays a key role in stratification systems. Spousal resemblance reinforces social boundaries within and across generations, and the rules of intermarriage govern the ways that social mobility may occur. We examine intermarriage across social origin and education boundaries in the United States using data from the 1968–2013 Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Our evidence points to a pattern of status exchange—that is, persons with high education from modest backgrounds tend to marry those with lower education from more privileged backgrounds. Our study contributes to an active methodological debate by pinpointing the conditions under which the results pivot from evidence against exchange to evidence for exchange and advances theory by showing that the rules of exchange are more consistent with the notion of diminishing marginal utility than the more general theory of compensating differentials.https://www.sociologicalscience.com/articles-v3-44-1003/Exchange MarriageHomogamyIntermarriageSocial Stratification |
collection |
DOAJ |
language |
English |
format |
Article |
sources |
DOAJ |
author |
Christine R. Schwartz Zhen Zeng Yu Xie |
spellingShingle |
Christine R. Schwartz Zhen Zeng Yu Xie Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States Sociological Science Exchange Marriage Homogamy Intermarriage Social Stratification |
author_facet |
Christine R. Schwartz Zhen Zeng Yu Xie |
author_sort |
Christine R. Schwartz |
title |
Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States |
title_short |
Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States |
title_full |
Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States |
title_fullStr |
Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States |
title_full_unstemmed |
Marrying Up by Marrying Down: Status Exchange between Social Origin and Education in the United States |
title_sort |
marrying up by marrying down: status exchange between social origin and education in the united states |
publisher |
Society for Sociological Science |
series |
Sociological Science |
issn |
2330-6696 2330-6696 |
publishDate |
2016-11-01 |
description |
Intermarriage plays a key role in stratification systems. Spousal resemblance reinforces social boundaries within and across generations, and the rules of intermarriage govern the ways that social mobility may occur. We examine intermarriage across social origin and education boundaries in the United States using data from the 1968–2013 Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Our evidence points to a pattern of status exchange—that is, persons with high education from modest backgrounds tend to marry those with lower education from more privileged backgrounds. Our study contributes to an active methodological debate by pinpointing the conditions under which the results pivot from evidence against exchange to evidence for exchange and advances theory by showing that the rules of exchange are more consistent with the notion of diminishing marginal utility than the more general theory of compensating differentials. |
topic |
Exchange Marriage Homogamy Intermarriage Social Stratification |
url |
https://www.sociologicalscience.com/articles-v3-44-1003/ |
work_keys_str_mv |
AT christinerschwartz marryingupbymarryingdownstatusexchangebetweensocialoriginandeducationintheunitedstates AT zhenzeng marryingupbymarryingdownstatusexchangebetweensocialoriginandeducationintheunitedstates AT yuxie marryingupbymarryingdownstatusexchangebetweensocialoriginandeducationintheunitedstates |
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1725587439186083840 |