Brad Wilcox Profile picture
Professor @UVA | Fellow @FamStudies | Fellow @AEI | Order GET MARRIED: https://t.co/cnpIrktyxI
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Dec 19 5 tweets 2 min read
In 2024, the link between voting Republican & having more babies deepened. Here's what it looked like in the '24 presidential election: Image Here's the shift illustrated from 2012-2024 by @grantjbailey:

R Squared goes from...

.08 in 2012 to .26 in 2024: Image
Oct 31 9 tweets 4 min read
1. "Is the long-standing tie between the Republican Party & marriage fraying in an era when the party’s standard bearer has flouted so many of the institution’s values and virtues?

No, the data suggest that the relationship between the Republican Party and marriage has largely persisted amidst the Trump era." @FamStudiesifstudies.org/blog/the-repub… 2. "Overall, the relative Republican advantage when it comes to [marriage] has grown a bit, even as fewer Americans—including Republicans—are currently married."

Re: Marriage:
✔️ In 2000, Rs > Ds by 10 percentage pts
✔️ In 2022, Rs > Ds 15 percentage pts Image
Sep 28 4 tweets 2 min read
Never thought I'd see this.

Churchgoing ⬆️ in Gen Z.

Led by... young men.

@ryanburge: "Religious attendance is actually *increasing* among [young] men." Image
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Source:
Sep 25 5 tweets 2 min read
1. We know the "success sequence" is tied to better economic outcomes for young adults.

The sequence is also tied to better emotional outcomes & less distress. @FamStudies
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2. "Even after controlling for income, the sequence remains a significant factor in predicting young adult mental health. Their odds of experiencing high emotional distress by their mid-30s are reduced by about 50% for young adults who have completed the 3 steps of the Success Sequence, after controlling for a range of background factors."
Sep 12 8 tweets 4 min read
1. Parenthood gets a bad rap in MSM (see NYT below).

Given @JonHaidt @jean_twenge research on ideology & mental health, I wondered if negativity driven by progressive commitments of journalists. Turns out:

Striking differences in parental happiness by ideology, per 2022 GSS.
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2. Today, "conservative parents are more likely to report they are very happy w their lives" than liberals

✔️33% of conservative parents "very happy" VS
✔️ 22% of liberal parents "very happy"

Source: @WendyRWang @AlysseElHage @BradWilcoxIFS @Deseret deseret.com/family/2024/09…
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Aug 18 4 tweets 2 min read
If "conservative forms of fatherhood were obviously toxic relative to the Walzian glories of liberal dadhood, you would presumably expect to see those effects made manifest among children," @DouthatNYT. But the data pt in a different direction:

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As @JonHaidt has noted, it's progressive young women whose mental health has tanked the most in recent years: afterbabel.com/p/mental-healt…
Jul 15 6 tweets 2 min read
1. Big family policy news w/ this selection.

@JDVance1 interested in advancing policies re:

✓ Marriage penalties facing w-c families

✓ Minimizing costs of having a baby

✓ Maximizing childcare choices

✓ Expanding child tax credit

@politicopoliti.co/3zI3Ubr 2. @JDVance1 proposed amendment re: the marriage penalty congress.gov/amendment/118t…
Jan 14 5 tweets 2 min read
Why the concern re: polyamory, asks @justin_mogilski of the University of South Carolina?

It's not about some antiquated hangup.

It's that monogamy is a major social achievement, as Harvard's @JoHenrich's work has shown.

Why does monogamy matter?

Let me count the ways🧵Image Men and women are pulled in a variety of sometimes conflicting directions when it comes to mating. Monogamous societies, @JoHenrich's work suggests, channel mating towards pair bonding. What are the collective benefits?

1) Monogamy reduces rape, murder, and social disorder. Image
Nov 7, 2023 5 tweets 2 min read
1. Fascinating new study from @rlhopcro @unccharlotte:

The relationship between 💵 & key family outcomes (being married, having kids, getting divorced) varies a lot by sex, even today.

@FamStudiesifstudies.org/blog/whose-mon… 2. For

✔️ men, more 💵 = more marriage

✔️ women, more 💵 = less marriage

Source: @rlhopcro @unccharlotte
ifstudies.org/blog/whose-mon…
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Jul 26, 2023 6 tweets 3 min read
1. We know smartphones have created big problems for teens, thanks to @jean_twenge @JonHaidt.

But what about adults?

What’s the impact of smartphones on adults?

@WendyRWang investigates smartphones & marriage in this new @FamStudies research:

ifstudies.org/blog/more-scro… 2. One therapist:📱“have caused more upheaval than anything I’ve seen in my career. We’ve normalized them being intrusive & taking precedence when people are lying in bed, playing Wordle or scrolling through TikTok rather than talking to each other.”

Are his concerns merited?
Jun 27, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
New study:

Happiest men and women in Europe are:

✔️ In *neotraditional relationships* where he works full-time, she works part-time

✔️ Married

✔️ Parents of young children

Unhappiest are:

✔️ She works, he doesn’t

✔️ Neither work

academic.oup.com/esr/advance-ar… Descriptive statistics for satisfaction for European men & women + details



Jun 11, 2023 6 tweets 4 min read
1. NEW: Growing ideological polarization between men/women spells bad news for marriage as

✔️ Y men moving slightly Right

✔️ Y women moving strongly Left

& “fewer Americans willing to date/marry across aisle.”

My latest w/ @lymanstoneky @TheAtlantic
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… 2. @TheAtlantic: In last decade, “Young single men have been moving to the right, even as their female peers have been moving even further left.” theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… Image
Jun 10, 2023 5 tweets 3 min read
"Men need a mission. 'For the average guy, there’s no more important mission than being a husband and a father,'" I told @HadleyHeath. @NRO nationalreview.com/magazine/2023/… A big reason young men are floundering is that the meaning and responsibilities afforded by marriage & fatherhood are not theirs and not even on their horizon. So, there's nothing really to strive *for*. They have no mission in life.
May 29, 2023 5 tweets 2 min read
Striking, new evidence young men in America are moving Right:

✔️ Fewer than half of Gen Z men think “feminism has made America a better place” Image This comes on heels of evidence fr @jean_twenge’s new book, *Generations*, which shows HS boys turning right (even as female peers turn left). Stunning ideological divide among HS seniors today:

✔️ @ 65% of HS senior boys conservative

✔️ @ 31% of HS senior girls conservative Image
May 29, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
1. “The US Government can do nothing to promote marriage”

I hear this a lot from scholars & journalists who point to Bush marriage initiative to advance the claim.

But they’re wrong.

Our biggest federal agency has a long record of promoting marriage.
ifstudies.org/blog/how-the-m… 2. Consider this:

In the U.S. military, officers & enlisted

✔️ Marry at relatively younger ages

✔️ Marry at higher rates

✔️ Witness virtually no racial divide in marriage

ifstudies.org/blog/how-the-m… @FamStudies Image
Feb 20, 2023 4 tweets 3 min read
1. New from @dcoxpolls: “Close to half (45%) of college-educated single women say their relationship status is largely due to an inability to find someone who meets their expectations.” @FamStudies @AEI ifstudies.org/blog/the-colle… 2. For a majority of single, college-educated women these are dating liabilities:

Being

✔️ Republican
✔️ Not college-educated
✔️ Very religious

Narrows the pool a good bit. Source: @dcoxpolls
Jan 19, 2023 6 tweets 6 min read
1. Been spotlighting👇🏼 *bad news* about Teens & Tech.

But now looks like *good news* coming from Utah.

UT is poised to take lead in treating “Big Tech like Big Tobacco” w/ raft of reform laws designed to help families navigate social media: deseret.com/2023/1/18/2355… @SpencerJCox 2. Utah legislature & @GovCox are responding to research like this report from @jean_twenge et al indicating that Big Tech & social media, in particular, are fueling depression, loneliness, and suicide among teens, esp teen girls: ifstudies.org/ifs-admin/reso…
Jan 18, 2023 6 tweets 4 min read
1. A new analysis by the @AEI Housing Center reveals that one group outperforms all others when it comes to achieving homeownership: married couples. Moreover, this is true for both black and white Americans. ifstudies.org/blog/the-benef… 2. Across entire income spectrum, there is, on average, an approx 20-percentage-points boost in homeownership rates for black & white married households (compared to non-married households) when comparing those of similar income level: @AEI @FamStudies ifstudies.org/blog/the-benef…
Jan 17, 2023 5 tweets 4 min read
1. “Young and middle-aged American men are less likely to be working now than at any time in U.S. history.” @jtrothwell @Gallup has a new take on why this is happening. ifstudies.org/blog/scarred-b… 2. What @jtrothwell is trying to understand is this, the dramatic decline in male LFP since the 1960s:
Dec 27, 2022 10 tweets 6 min read
1. Motherhood is a pathway to misery & immiseration. This is the message much of the ambient culture sends today, esp. since COVID. But is it true?

Actually, no.

@WendyRWang & I survey the data on happiness, loneliness & prosperity @TheAtlantic:
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… 2. Here's a sampling from the @nytimes, Bloomberg @business, and @Forbes of the negative messaging regarding motherhood and marriage that we've been fed of late:
Dec 26, 2022 4 tweets 4 min read
Responding to @JillFilipovic’s assertion that stay-at-home moms are miserable (see below), @lymanstoneky crunched the numbers. He found:

“Survey evidence shows stay-at-home mothers are… just as happy as other mothers.”

It’s #5 @FamStudies for 2022.

ifstudies.org/blog/are-stay-… Image “Stay-at-home moms had about the same likelihood of being ‘very happy’ as working married moms.” @lymanstoneky ifstudies.org/blog/are-stay-… @FamStudies Image