News Faith

Dorothy Cummings McLean

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Virginia, May 24, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) ― A recent survey of families worldwide has revealed that very religious, traditional women are the happiest wives.

The study shows that women in highly religious marriages, “especially traditionalists,” reported the highest satisfaction in the quality of their relationships. Women in “shared, secular progressive relationships” reported “relatively high levels of relationship quality.” However, women in “the ideological and religious middle” reported having lower quality relationships.

The Institute for Family Studies conducted an investigation into the question, “Is religion a force for good or ill for families around the globe?” Entitled "The Ties That Bind," the study examines “relationship quality, fertility, domestic violence, and infidelity” in 11 different countries: Argentina, Australia, Chile, Canada, Colombia, France, Ireland, Mexico, Peru, the United Kingdom, and the United States.


It discovered that “highly religious couples” have better relationships and more “sexual satisfaction” than less or mixed religious couples and non-religious couples. In fact, women in “highly religious” marriages are “about 50 percent more likely to report that they are strongly satisfied with their sexual relationship than their secular and less religious counterparts,” the study said.

But according to "The Ties That Bind," highly religious spouses and secular couples do have one thing in common: They are better at shared decision-making than couples who are less religious or mixed secular/religious.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, those who attend religious services have more children than those who do not: 0.27 more, in fact. Also unsurprisingly, religious people are more likely than secular people to marry, which is also a factor in fertility, as married couples have more children than unmarried couples.

In terms of domestic violence, religiosity does not seem to be a factor. “Slightly more than 20 percent of the men in our sample report perpetuating IPV, and a bit more than 20 percent of the women in our sample indicate that they have been victims of IPV in their relationship,” the Institute for the Family reported.

“Our results suggest, then, that religion is not protective against domestic violence for this sample of couples from the Americas, Europe, and Oceania. However, religion is not an increased risk factor for domestic violence in these countries, either.”