Change of Lifestyles

There has been intense debate for some time now on change in partnership lifestyles. It is well known that the proliferation of marriage is in decline and the significance of domestic partnership is on the increase. It is still disputable whether these developments offset one another; it is becoming rather a structural displacement from marital to non-marital cohabitation; or beyond that, there is a rise in singleness, i.e. “partnerlessness.” Against this background the project illuminates how the change in partnership lifestyles is taking place in (West) Germany since the beginning of the 1960s. The central focus is on observed changes over time along with developments in life course of different birth cohorts. An analytical approach is utilized to query social conditions of partnership lifestyles. The main interest is directed at the change in these social conditions in cohort succession and in particular the change in the significance of education which is to be expected against the background of familial economic considerations. The data basis is provided by various harmonized and cumulated surveys of the microcensus.

• Lengerer, Andrea, 2011: Partnerlosigkeit in Deutschland. Entwicklung und soziale Unterschiede. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag. 
• Lengerer, Andrea, 2011: Gleiches Ausmaß, unterschiedliche Formen des partnerschaftlichen Zusammenlebens. Eine Kohortenanalyse für Ost- und Westdeutschland, Informationsdienst soziale Indikatoren (45): 11-15. [.pdf]
• Lengerer, Andrea; Klein, Thomas, 2007: Der langfristige Wandel partnerschaftlicher Lebensformen im Spiegel des Mikrozensus, Wirtschaft und Statistik 2007 (04): 433-447. [.pdf] (663 kB)