Fewer than half of Americans say that society is better off when more people are married.
The finding comes from the American Family Survey 2025, an annual, nationwide study of 3,000 Americans by the Deseret News, Brigham Young University’s Wheatley Institute and the Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy at BYU.
The finding also comes shortly after the 30th anniversary of “The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” which the late President Gordon B. Hinckley introduced on Sept. 23, 1995, during the general Relief Society meeting. Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints also refer to this proclamation as “The Family Proclamation.”
For three decades, the principles and doctrine outlined in this document have helped members of the Church, as well as others, to strengthen and understand the importance of family in God’s eternal plan.
In a question-and-answer devotional with young single adults in 2021, President Jeffrey R. Holland, president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, explained one of the reasons the Church focuses on marriage is because the doctrinal significance of marriage and family throughout the world has been demeaned over the last few decades. “The Lord expects us to revere marriage and family and the bearing of children,” President Holland said.
In the American Family Survey 2025, researchers from the Wheatley Institute and the Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy write that marriage is broadly a beneficial institution that helps lift people out of poverty, alleviate loneliness and provide stable homes for children. Fewer marriages means more people miss out on these benefits, while society as a whole loses strength.
Marriage isn’t a perfect institution, the researchers acknowledge, and abusive relationships and other problems deserve “serious attention.”
But indifference to marriage, especially if it leads to fewer people being married, “is not a healthy sign for the American public.”
“Indifference to marriage suggests a complacency and a lack of energy that is likely to have costs in the future,” the researchers write. “Public opinion surveys are hardly good signposts to what those costs might be, but we believe there will be costs in the long run. …
“Public attitudes are turning downward on this institution, and a better understanding of why attitudes are shifting, leading to new arguments and actions, are probably necessary if we want to arrest this trend.”
Marriage and societal welfare
The American Family Survey 2025 reports that 45% of survey respondents agreed with the statement “Society is better off when more people are married.” This is down from 49% in 2024, 46% in 2023 and 2022, 49% in 2020 and 2019, and 53% in 2018. It’s on par with 2021’s finding of 45%.
Additionally, among those who agree that society is better off when more people are married, only 11% “strongly” agree, down from 21% in 2018. 13% simply “agree,” down from 17% in 2018; and 18% “somewhat agree,” up from 12% in 2018.
Why the lowering support for the institution of marriage? While the causes are multifaceted, one contributing factor seems to be a devaluing of family and children, Church News previously reported.
A 2024 study conducted by Pew Research Center found that among young adults without children, less than half of women — about 45% — said they want to be parents some day.
At the same time, research by the Institute for Family Studies shows that more U.S. women are skipping motherhood. In 2020, 1-in-6 women reaching the end of their childbearing years had never given birth.
Church leaders have expressed concern about these issues. In 2023, President Dallin H. Oaks, then the first counselor in the First Presidency, spoke to Latter-day Saint young adults around the globe about the nature and extent of marriage in the United States and in the Church.
President Oaks showed a chart illustrating the reduction in the percentage of adults in the United States who marry. Not only are fewer Americans marrying, but they are marrying older and, therefore, having fewer children, including within the Church.
These declines represent lost opportunities and postponed blessings, President Oaks said. “It means decreased opportunities to work together to build the kingdom of God. And most important, it means fewer children born to grow up with the blessings of the gospel.”
For young adults worried about the shortage of affordable homes and increasing amounts of student debt, President Oaks counseled them to go forward with faith and do their best in circumstances less favorable than previous generations faced.
“Just remember, a loving Heavenly Father has a plan for His young adults, and part of that plan is marriage and children,” President Oaks said.
Other attitudes about marriage
In addition to the relationship between marriage and society’s well-being, the American Family Survey 2025 asked participants about their attitudes toward a variety of other ideas about marriage.
For instance, 56% of respondents said they agree that marriage makes families and children better off financially. Of those, 15% said they “strongly agree,” 20% said they “agree,” and 21% said they “somewhat agree.”
The overall percentage is down from the 64% of people who agreed in 2018. Of those, 22% said they “strongly agree,” 23% said they “agree,” and 18% said they “somewhat agree.”
Additionally, the overall percentage of people who agree that marriage makes families and children better off financially has fluctuated between 2018 and 2025:
- 2025: 56%
- 2024: 58%
- 2023: 54%
- 2022: 58%
- 2021: 58%
- 2020: 60%
- 2019: 60%
- 2018: 64%
The survey also found that 54% of people agree that marriage is needed to create strong families. Of those, 19% “strongly agree,” 16% “agree,” and 17% “somewhat agree.”
The overall percentage is down from 59% of people who agreed in 2018. Of those, 26% said they “strongly agree,” 18% said they “agree,” and 13% said they “somewhat agree.”
Additionally, the overall percentage of people who agree that marriage is needed to create strong families has fluctuated between 2018 and 2025:
- 2025: 54% agree.
- 2024: 57% agree.
- 2023: 51% agree.
- 2022: 55% agree.
- 2021: 52% agree.
- 2020: 54% agree.
- 2019: 54% agree.
- 2018: 59% agree.
“The pattern is clearly that the group who ‘strongly’ agrees with these claims has slid by around 7 to 10 percentage points,” the survey researchers write, “and the group that merely ‘somewhat agrees’ is growing, with some people sliding off of the agreement side in these years.
“All of this is consistent with the idea of a growing indifference to marriage as an institution that is important for families. Agreement remains, but only ‘somewhat.’”
Other statements in the survey include “Being legally married is not as important as having a personal sense of commitment to your partner” (54% agree, up from 51% last year and 44% in 2018); “Marriage is old-fashioned and out-of-date” (17% agree, the same as last year but up from 14% in 2018); and “marriage is more of a burden than benefit to couples” (15% agree, down from 17% last year but up from 14% in 2018).
