More young married couples in S'pore going separate ways

More young married couples in S'pore going separate ways
Sheralyn Taysheralyn@mediacorp.com.sg

AS PART of a worrying trend, divorces among those aged 20 to 24 have seen the sharpest increase in the last 10 years compared to that of all other age groups.

But the largest number of divorces is still among males in the 35 to 44 age bracket and females in the 25 and 34 age group — on par with 2005 figures.

Altogether, there were 7,091 divorces last year, compared to 6,909 in 2005.
On the other hand, the 23,706 people saying "I do" in 2006 was a 3.1-per-cent increase from the previous year, but is still lower than the annual average of 24,800 recorded in the 1990s.

These findings on marriages and divorces — released by the Singapore Department of Statistics yesterday — also revealed an increase in the number of inter-ethnic marriages, especially among Muslims.

Some 30 per cent — or 1,199 — of Muslim marriages last year were mixed matches, up from 21 per cent 10 years ago. However, this was accompanied by an increase in the proportion of divorces among Muslims in inter-ethnic marriages, which rose from 12 per cent in 1996 to 20 per cent last year.

According to National University of Singapore sociologist Dr Paulin Straughan, "this could be due to more inter-ethnic marriages, so it might be a corresponding trend".
Mixed marriages require a lot more work, Dr Straughan said.
"While there is the assumption of shared traits within the same ethnic group, for inter-ethnic marriages, there must be other commonalities such as education or religion. For marriage, the notion of 'opposites attract' is a misnomer; it does not always work like that. In most cases, there needs to be shared identity." But not all couples may understand this, she said, leading to problems in married life.

On the whole, Singaporeans are marrying later than in 1996, with the median age for first-time grooms at 29.7 and brides at 27.

The percentage of marriages between couples with an age difference of more than 10 years has also increased, from 7.2 per cent in 1996 to 9.6 per cent in 2006.

In general, Dr Straughan noted that the statistics did not buck the trends of high divorce rates and later marriages.
"For divorces, the trends have shown that young marriages are at risk. What alarms us is that it's gone up even higher, so marriage preparation is more critical. These figures show that people are not entering marriage fully aware of the commitment, requisite roles and responsibility involved."