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• Crime, justice and law
• Family justice system
• Family Court Statistics Quarterly: January to March 2024
• Ministry of Justice

Guide to Family Court Statistics

Published 27 June 2024

© Crown copyright 2024

This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: [email protected] .

Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.

This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/family-court-statistics-quarterly-january-to-march-2024/guide-to-family-court-statistics

1. Introduction

Family Court Statistics in England and Wales are published every quarter, presenting the key statistics on activity in the family court system. This document aims to provide a comprehensive guide to the family court system, focusing on concepts and definitions published in Ministry of Justice statistics. It also covers statistical publication strategy, revisions, data sources, data quality, and dissemination. There is also a separate Quality Statement released alongside this guide.

The key areas covered in this guide are:

A high-level background to the family court system, focusing on the topics featured in the Family Court Statistics Quarterly (FCSQ) bulletin.

Information on the frequency and timings of the bulletin and its revisions policy.

Details of the data sources and any associated data quality issues.

Major legislation in the period covered by the bulletin.

A glossary of the main terms used within the publications.

A list of relevant internet sites on the Family Court system.

2. Background to the Family Court statistics

Family law is the area of law that deals with:

Public law – local authority intervention to protect children;

Private law – parental disputes concerning the upbringing of children;

Matrimonial cases – divorces, annulments and separations;

Financial Remedy (formerly known as ‘ancillary relief’) – financial provisions after divorce or relationship breakdown;

Domestic violence remedy orders;

Forced marriage protection orders;

Female genital mutilation protection orders;

The Mental Capacity Act; and

The Single Family court (also known as ‘the Family Court’) was implemented on 22 April 2014. Proceedings are issued by the Family Court and are allocated to a level of judge according to their type and complexity. The Single Family court aims to enable magistrates, legal advisers and the judiciary to work more closely together.

Previously, family cases were dealt with at Family Proceedings Courts (which were part of magistrates’ courts), at county courts or in the Family Division of the High Court.  These cases are now dealt within the Family Court and the High Court and most cases affecting children are dealt with under the Children Act 1989.

The Designated Family Judge (DFJ) has a role in leading the Family Court and managing its workload in distinct areas across England and Wales (called DFJ areas. Each DFJ area has a Designated Family Centre which is the principal family court location for each DFJ area. This is the location where all family applications from that DFJ area are sent to for initial consideration.

Family cases still need HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) staff to administer them through the Family Court. What may have changed is how family work is received, distributed and listed within the DFJ areas. For example, in some areas more family work may be heard at the Designated Family Centre, with allocation and listing being managed from that location, with some other work taking place elsewhere.

3. Public Law

Data quality note Please note that there are several public law data series affected by HMCTS Reform and have been removed from Quarter 1 2022. Please see the data quality notice in the most recent bulletin for further details.

Public law cases are those brought by local authorities or an authorised person (currently only the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children) to protect the child and ensure they get the care they need. In these proceedings, the child is automatically a party and is represented by a Children’s Guardian appointed by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass). The Children’s Guardian is an independent person who is there to promote the child’s welfare and ensure that the arrangements made for the child are in his or her best interests.

A range of different orders can be applied for. The main types of order are a care or supervision order which determines whether the child should be looked after or supervised by the local authority, and an emergency protection order which allows an individual or local authority to take a child away from a place where they are in immediate danger to a place of safety. The majority (two thirds) of Public law applications are for care orders.

The Public Law Outline flowchart provides more information about the main court processes for Children Act Public Law cases.

Following the publicity surrounding Baby P case [footnote 1] , the number of children involved in public law applications made by local authorities increased . Figures remained steady until 2015, after which there was a steady increase, such that prior to the pandemic, in 2019 there were around 30,000 individual children involved in public law applications.

Cafcass also publishes (England only) data on the number of care applications .

Case level care order figures are currently not produced by the MoJ and so comparisons between the two datasets cannot be made at this time.

3.1 Timeliness of Public Law Care and Supervision applications

In the interests of the child, courts try to minimise the length of time it takes for a case to be resolved. However, many factors can affect how long the case takes, such as the type of order applied for, the number of parties involved and how complex the child’s situation is. In general, there is a wide spread of case durations with many straight-forward cases being completed fairly quickly, more complicated cases taking longer and a few very complex ones taking a long time.

The care and supervision timeliness measure presented in this bulletin considers cases that began with a care or supervision application and measures the time from the application until the first of seven disposal types for each individual child. The seven valid disposal types for the purposes of this measure are a care order, a supervision order, a residence order, a special guardianship order, the application withdrawn, an order refused or an order of no order.

The bulletin presents the average, or ‘mean’, case duration, which can be quite heavily influenced by a few very long durations. We therefore also present the median timeliness in the accompanying tables, which is the length of time within which a definitive disposal was reached for half of all children involved which is less affected by cases with very long durations.

4. Private Law

Private law cases are court cases between two or more private individuals who are trying to resolve a dispute. This is generally where parents have split up and there is a disagreement about who the children should live with and have contact or otherwise spend time with. A range of different types of court order can be applied for, including “Section 8” orders (referring to the relevant section of the Children Act 1989), parental responsibility, financial applications and special guardianship orders. The vast majority of private law applications are for Section 8 orders, which include a child arrangements order determining who the child should live with and when and who a child should have contact with or spend time with.

The Private Law Outline flowchart provides more information about the main court processes for Children Act Public Law cases.

Cafcass also publishes (England only) data on the number of private law cases started .

Figure 1 compares both Cafcass and MoJ figures and shows that the trends are similar (for 2018-2020, MoJ figures have been higher on average, increasing gradually from 9% higher in 2014 to 18% in 2022, and 16% in 2023).

The difference between MoJ and Cafcass figures is mainly due to Cafcass only receiving section 8 cases [footnote 2]   from the courts. Other differences between the datasets include the following:

Section 8 cases where all of the issues are dealt with on the day (called ‘urgent without notice’ applications) should not be sent to Cafcass

Section 8 cases which are not listed within the Private Law Programme (PLP) and do not have a first hearing dispute resolution appointment (FHDRA) should also not be sent to Cafcass

Certain non-section 8 cases can be sent to Cafcass if the subject child is a party to ongoing proceedings (and a Cafcass officer has been appointed as the children’s guardian) or the court is directed to do so by a judge or legal advisor

This accounts for the discrepancy between the two datasets which cannot be accurately matched as it is impossible to identify the various situations described above from administrative data sources (particularly the ‘urgent without notice’ applications).

Figure 1: Comparison of the number of private law cases received, as recorded by Cafcass and MoJ (England only), January to March 2011 to January to March 2024

4.1 Timeliness of Private Law Cases

The private law timeliness measure presented in the quarterly bulletin considers cases that began with a private law application and measures the time from case start date until a final order has been issued in the family court.

As with public law, it presents the average, or ‘mean’, case durations, which can be quite heavily influenced by a few long durations, and therefore the median timeliness which is the length of time within which a definitive disposal was reached for half of all the cases is also presented.

4.2 Disposal of public and private law applications

There are four ways in which an application can be disposed of:

withdrawn applications – applications can only be withdrawn by order of the court.

order refused – in public law proceedings, an order is refused if the grounds are not proved and the court has dismissed the application. In private law proceedings, the court may refuse to make an order or make an order of no order.

order of no order – this is made if the court has applied the principle of non-intervention under section 1(5) of the Act. This means that the court shall not make an order unless it would be better for the child to make an order.

full order made – the type of order made may not be the same as the type of application that was originally applied for. An order is made in favour of one of the parties (Local Authority, parent or other guardian) however this aspect of the case outcome is not recorded on the central case management system (FamilyMan).

If a child arrangement order is breached, a party may apply to the court for an enforcement order to be made. Since December 2008, contact orders (and subsequently child arrangement orders) routinely contain a warning notice stating the consequences if a party fails to keep to the requirements of the order. For earlier orders, the party seeking enforcement must first apply to the court to have a warning notice attached to the order, and the relevant party informed that a notice has been attached. The enforcement order generally requires the person who has breached the order to undertake unpaid work, although if a party has suffered financial loss as a result of the breach they may apply for financial compensation. If other types of order are breached, it is possible for a party to apply for committal, so the breach is dealt with as contempt of court; however, this is very rare.

4.3 Mediation

Mediation can be particularly beneficial where there will be a continuing relationship following dispute resolution – such as in family cases. Family mediation can help reduce hostility and improve chances of long-term co-operation between parents and couples, for example in agreeing arrangements for their children and financial matters.

Before applying to the Family Court, people will need to prove they’ve considered mediation first. They can do this:

by showing they are exempt from having to consider mediation, for example, if domestic violence is involved; or

by proving to the judge that they have been to a ‘mediation information and assessment meeting’ (MIAM) with a family mediator but that mediation is not suitable for them.

This was enacted in the Children & Families Act 2014 .

The Legal Aid Agency publishes figures on the number of publicly funded mediations:

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/legal-aid-statistics

5. Legal representation

Legal representation status as published within family court statistics reflects whether details of an applicant’s/respondent’s legal representative has been recorded or left blank within FamilyMan, the family court case management system. A blank field is assumed to indicate that no legal representative has been used.

Table 10 suggests that for almost half of the divorces not involving financial remedies disposed, neither party had legal representation. However, further analysis showed that these were uncontested cases and almost all of them did not have a single hearing. Therefore, parties recorded as without legal representation are not necessarily self-representing litigants in person .

To provide a better proxy for litigants in person, a new table was produced which gives the number of parties in cases with at least one hearing, by their legal representation status (Table 11).

There was a revision to the methodology used to produce Tables 10 and 11 [footnote 3] – specifically to account for the issue in public law cases where applicants would generally be public bodies (mostly local authorities) with access to their own legal resources, but who would previously have been shown as an ‘unrepresented’ party. This was amended such that they are now shown as represented parties in the above tables, and this changed the percentage of applicants with legal representation in public law cases with at least one hearing from around 20% to 99%. The overall trends seen in the mean time to disposal of public law cases by representation type however (Table 10) have not changed.

Please note that the majority of the work done in the Court and Tribunal Service Centre in divorce (see section on Core Case Data) are online applications from unrepresented parties.

5.1 Legal representation and its relationship with timeliness

Different types of cases tend to take different lengths of time to complete – in general public law cases for children take longer than private law cases and divorce cases tend to be quite lengthy due to set time limits, whereas domestic violence cases are usually completed in a fairly short time due to their nature. Another factor that may influence how long a case takes is whether one or both parties had a legal representative or alternatively represented themselves. This may also be affected by whether the parties consent to the application or are contesting it which in turn may reflect the complexity of the case.

5.2 Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act 2012

This created the Legal Aid Agency, an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice, on the 1st April 2013, following the abolition of the Legal Services Commission. The implementation of the Act also made changes to the scope and eligibility of legal aid, removing some types of case from the scope of legal aid funding, and only allowing other cases to qualify if they meet certain criteria. Funding is no longer available for private family law, such as divorce and disputes over arrangements for children. Family law cases involving domestic violence, forced marriage or child abduction will continue to receive funding.

Full details of the LASPO Act .

The removal of legal aid for many private law cases resulted in a change in the pattern of legal representation, and Figure 4 of the FCSQ bulletin shows how this changed over time. Around the time that the LASPO reforms were implemented, there was a marked increase in the number and proportion of cases where neither party were represented, with an equivalent drop in the proportion of cases where both parties were represented. In 2023, neither the applicant nor respondent had legal representation in 39% of private law disposals, an increase of 20 percentage points from 2013. Correspondingly, the proportion of disposals where both parties had legal representation dropped by 14 percentage points over the same period.

The Legal Aid Agency (LAA - formerly the Legal Services Commission) collects statistics on those applying for legal aid, and figures on the number of applications received and certificates granted by various Family categories have been published in their annual and quarterly statistical reports.

6. Matrimonial cases

There are two ways to legally end a marriage or a civil partnership. An individual can apply for a divorce which will give them a final order (previously known as a decree absolute), ending a valid marriage or civil partnership – this occurs in the vast majority of cases. Alternatively, an individual can apply for a decree of nullity, which declares that the marriage or civil partnership itself is void, specifically no valid marriage or civil partnership ever existed; or voidable, specifically the marriage or civil partnership was valid unless annulled. No application can be made for divorce within the first year of a marriage or a civil partnership. An alternative to divorce is a decree of judicial separation or a decree of separation of civil partners, but this does not allow them to remarry or enter into a civil partnership. Figure 2 shows the main court processes for divorce or dissolution cases.

The Office of National Statistics also publishes statistics on the number of divorces occurring each year in England and Wales .

Figure 2: The main court processes for divorce cases

During 2014 and 2015, a number of centralised divorce centres were introduced in England and Wales, with the vast majority of uncontested decree nisi applications being considered by Legal Advisers (rather than district judges) at those centres. Some have since closed and the majority of divorce cases are now handled digitally by the Courts and Tribunal Service Centres (CTSCs). Further details on court closures can be provided upon request.

Following the Children and Families Act 2014, couples divorcing are no longer required to provide information on children as part of the divorce process. We therefore removed this information from the accompanying relevant csv file to avoid misleading conclusions being made.

6.1 New divorce legislation – Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020

New legislation came into effect from 6th April 2022, following the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020. The key changes include:

• Ability for either a joint or sole application for divorce, civil partnership and judicial separation
• Removal of the Facts (i.e. no grounds for divorce, civil partnership or separation)
• Some timeliness changes (i.e. the respondent in a sole application has 14 days to respond not 7 days, and also there is an inclusion of a mandatory 20 week period from issue to conditional order)
• Ability to change from joint to sole application at the conditional (CO) and final order (FO) stages

There are also several terminology changes:

• A petition is now an application;
• A petitioner is now an applicant;
• A decree nisi is now a conditional order;
• A decree absolute is now a final order.

As a result of these changes, the main divorce table in FCSQ (Table 12) has a filter added so that users can separate out old and new divorce cases and a new table (Table 12b) has been added to expand on data available under the new divorce legislation.

6.2 Digital system

Following a testing phase, those citizens seeking to apply for divorce could do so via an online service which was rolled out across England and Wales from 1 May 2018 in stages. It offers prompts and guidance to assist people in completing their application, and uses clear, non-technical language. This digital system runs alongside the existing paper application.

Cases which were started between May 2018 and January 2019 would only have the petitions (applications) submitted online. This means whilst petitions may have been issued online, subsequent steps would have been via paper using the existing non-digital processes.

From January 2019 the online service developed in stages to cover the remaining aspects of the divorce process, with the full process rolled out nationally in September 2019.

7. Financial remedy (formerly ‘ancillary relief’) – financial disputes post-divorce/separation

During a divorce, a marriage annulment, a judicial separation, or the dissolution of a civil partnership there may still be a need for the court to settle disputes over money or property. The court can make a financial remedy order, formerly known as ‘ancillary relief’. These orders include dealing with the arrangements for the sale or transfer of property, maintenance payments, a lump sum payment or the sharing of a pension. Orders for financial provision other than for ancillary relief are not dependent upon divorce proceedings and may be made for children.

The Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act 2008 led to the creation of the Child Maintenance Enforcement Commission (CMEC) which replaced the Child Support Agency (CSA), although the CSA retained its existing caseload. The Act also removed the requirement for all parents in receipt of benefit to go through the CMEC even if they could reach agreement. Parents who were not on benefits were previously allowed to come to courts for consent orders. This change  likely increased the number of parties that came to court for maintenance consent orders.

If an order is breached, several options are open to the aggrieved party to seek enforcement of the order. For money orders, proceedings can be instituted in the family court where a variety of remedies such as attachment of earnings may be available. However, if arrears of more than one year are owed, the person seeking payment must first get the court’s permission to make an enforcement application.

Please note that data in Table 16 previously looked at financial remedy disposals, (which includes orders made and dismissals) by remedy type. However, during to differing ways of requesting these on the application (some request all types, either to have an order made or to be dismissed, others just request the type they require the order for), it has been deemed that the quality of this data is not suitable for publication in a National Statistics bulletin. Work is ongoing to collect robust data on orders made and this will be reported on when available.

Within Table 14 a split is given between contested and uncontested financial remedy applications. Where the first application lodged in a financial remedy case is for a consent order the case is considered to be uncontested, otherwise the case is considered to be contested.

8. Domestic violence remedy orders

Part IV of the Family Law Act 1996 provides single and unified domestic violence remedies in the family court and the High Court, with the vast majority carried out in the former. Figure 3 shows the main court processes for domestic violence remedy cases.

A range of people can apply to the court: spouses, cohabitants, ex-cohabitants, those who live or have lived in the same household (other than by reason of one of them being the other’s employee, tenant, lodger or boarder), certain relatives (for example, parents, grandparents, in-laws, brothers, sisters), and those who have agreed to marry one another.

Two types of order can be granted:

a non-molestation order, which can either prohibit particular behaviour or general molestation by someone who has previously been violent towards the applicant and/or any relevant children; and,

an occupation order, which can define or regulate rights of occupation of the home by the parties involved.

In July 2007, section 1 of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 came into force, making the breach of a non-molestation order a criminal offence. A power of arrest is therefore no longer required on a non-molestation order but instead it includes a penal notice. The court may also add an exclusion requirement to an emergency protection order or interim care order made under the Children Act 1989. This means a suspected abuser may be removed from the home, rather than the child.

Where the court makes an occupation order and it appears to the court that the respondent has used or threatened violence against the applicant or child, then the court must attach a power of arrest unless it is satisfied that the applicant or child will be adequately protected without such a power. If there is no power of arrest attached to the order, and the order is breached, this is dealt with as contempt of court. The court may then impose a fine or make a committal order whereby the person who breached the order is imprisoned or put on remand until the next hearing.

Figure 3: The main court processes for domestic violence remedy cases

9. Forced marriage protection orders

Applications for a Forced Marriage Protection Order (FMPO) can be made at 15 designated locations of the family court. This court, as well as the High Court, is able to make Forced Marriage Protection Orders to prevent forced marriages from occurring and to offer protection to victims who might have already been forced into a marriage.

From 16 June 2014, it is an offence to force a person to marry against their will, or to breach a FMPO. As a result, courts no longer need to attach a power of arrest to an FMPO, and so are no longer included in the relevant table.

From October-December 2018, there is a marked increase in the number of FMPOs made compared to the number of applications. Often there are multiple orders granted per case, where one application covers more than one person, and an order is granted for each person covered in the application. Extensions and increased provision of previous orders can also be granted as new orders, without the need for a new application to be submitted.

10. Female genital mutilation protection orders

Female Genital Mutilation Protection Orders (FGMPOs) are intended to safeguard girls who are at risk of FGM at home or abroad, or who are survivors. They came into effect on 17 July 2015.

11. Adoption

Data quality note Please note that there are several public law data series affected by HMCTS Reform and have been removed from Quarter 4 2022. Please see the data quality notice in the most recent bulletin for further details.

Prior to making an adoption application, a placement order is generally made to place a child with prospective adopters. If the placement is being made by an adoption agency, by a High Court order, or by the child’s parent, the placement period is 10 weeks before an adoption application can be made. For a step-parent, the placement duration is six months, while for local authority foster parents, it is usually one year. In other cases, the courts generally require the child to have been living with the prospective adopters for three out of the preceding five years. An application for adoption can be made to the family court in the area in which the child is living.

An adoption order made by a court extinguishes the rights, duties and obligations of the natural parents or guardian and vests them in the adopters. On the conclusion of an adoption the child becomes, for virtually all purposes in law, the child of its adoptive parents and has the same rights of inheritance of property as any children born to the adoptive parents. Figure 4 shows the main court processes for adoption cases.

Until 2012, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published adoption figures annually.

Figure 4: The main court processes for adoption cases

12. The Mental Capacity Act

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 provides a statutory framework to empower and protect vulnerable people who are not able to make their own decisions. It makes it clear who can take decisions, in which situations, and how they should go about this. It enables people to plan ahead for a time when they may lose capacity.

The Act created two new public bodies to support the statutory framework, both of which are designed around the needs of those who lack capacity.

The Court of Protection

The Public Guardian, supported by the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG)

12.1 The Court of Protection

The Court of Protection makes specific decisions, and also appoints other people (called deputies) to make decisions for people who lack the capacity to do this for themselves. These decisions are related to their property, financial affairs, health and personal welfare. The Court of Protection has powers to:

make declarations about a person’s capacity to make a particular decision, if the matter cannot be decided informally;

make decisions about serious medical treatment, which relate to providing, withdrawing or withholding treatment to a person who lacks capacity;

make decisions or orders about the personal welfare and property and affairs of people who lack capacity to make such decisions themselves;

authorise deprivation of liberty in relation to a person’s care and residence arrangements;

appoint a deputy to make ongoing decisions for people lacking capacity to make those decisions in relation to their personal welfare or property and financial affairs;

make decisions about a Lasting Power of Attorney or Enduring Power of Attorney, including whether the power is valid, objections to registration, the scope of attorney powers and the removal of attorney powers.

Most applications to the court are decided on the basis of paper evidence without holding a hearing. In around 95% of cases, the applicant does not need to attend court. Some applications such as those relating to personal welfare, objections in relation to deputies and attorneys, or large gifts or settlements for Inheritance Tax purposes may be contentious and it will be necessary for the court to hold a hearing to decide the case.

Following the introduction of new forms in July 2015, applicants must make separate applications for ‘property and affairs’ and ‘personal welfare’, resulting in the almost complete absence of ‘hybrid deputy’ applications since Q4 2015.

Applications relating to deprivation of liberty increased following the Supreme Court decision on 19 March 2014 [footnote 4] whereby it was considered a person could be deprived of their liberty in their own home, sheltered accommodation etc., and not just the nursing homes and hospitals which were previously covered.

In Re X and others [2014] EWCOP25 , the Court of Protection set out a new streamlined process to enable courts to deal with deprivation of liberty cases in a timely and just fashion. Half of applications for deprivation of liberty were made under this process.

NHS Digital publishes official statistics on the Mental Capacity Act 2005, Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards data collection . This includes any application to local authorities reported to NHS Digital that was received, processed or considered to be “active” in any way during the year.

12.2 Deprivation of Liberty (High Court)

In July 2022 the President of the Family Division launched the national deprivation of liberty court. Based at the Royal Courts of Justice, it deals with all new applications seeking authorisation to deprive children of their liberty under the inherent jurisdiction and ran for a pilot phase initially.

These applications differ to deprivation of liberty applications made under the Court of Protection (referenced above), with the distinction of being processed under the High Court. Applications processed under the High Court are specifically in relation to children and cover information included on the C66 application form – the form used to apply for an order under the High Court inherent jurisdiction in relation to children.

Data collected on deprivation of liberty (High Court) applications began in FCSQ from quarter 3 2023. Prior to this, Nuffield Family Justice Observatory reported on data during the pilot phase from July 2022 to June 2023 on a monthly basis. For information relating to trends prior to implementation in FCSQ, please see their last publication, National deprivation of liberty court: Latest data trends – June 2023 with links to previously published information.

12.3 Office of the Public Guardian

The Office of the Public Guardian (OPG), an agency of the Ministry of Justice, was established in October 2007, and supports the Public Guardian in registering Enduring Powers of Attorney (EPA), Lasting Powers of Attorney (LPA) and supervising Court of Protection (COP) appointed Deputies.

The OPG supports and promotes decision making for those who lack capacity or would like to plan for their future, within the framework of the Mental Capacity Act 2005. The role of the Public Guardian is to protect people who lack capacity from abuse. The Public Guardian, supported by the OPG, helps protect people who lack capacity by:

setting up and managing a register of LPAs and EPAs;

setting up and managing a register of Court appointed Deputies, supervising Court appointed Deputies, working with other relevant organisations (for example, social services, if the person who lacks capacity is receiving social care);

receiving annual financial reports from all primary Deputies under their supervision; and

dealing with cases, by way of investigations, where concerns are raised about the way in which Attorneys or Deputies are carrying out their duties.

The Power of Attorney (PoA) data provided by the Office of the Public Guardian for publication focuses on registrations, whereas previous receipts data provided data on all PoAs received (some of which would ultimately be withdrawn or rejected due to errors). Data on receipts may be introduced in future releases.

13. Probate

When a person dies, somebody has to deal with their estate (money property and possessions left) by collecting in all the money, paying any debts and distributing what is left to those people entitled to it. Probate is the court’s authority; given to a person or persons to administer a deceased person’s estate and the document issued by the Probate Service is called a Grant of Representation . This document is usually required by the asset holders as proof to show the correct person or persons have the Probate Service’s authority to administer a deceased person’s estate.

Grants of representation are known as either:

Probate – when the deceased person left a valid will and an executor is acting,

Letters of administration with will – when a person has left a valid will but no executor is acting, or

Letters of administration – usually when there is no valid will.

These different types of grants of representation appoint people known as personal representatives to administer the deceased person’s estate.

When a Probate is contested, the Chancery Division of the High Court deals with the matter. See the Guide to Civil and Administrative Justice Statistics for more information on the Chancery Division.

Grants of representation can be applied for digitally (and handled by the Courts and Tribunals Service Centre) or via the traditional paper route. The CTSC have trained substantial numbers of new staff and now has now got a broad multi skilled team who can process probate applications more quickly and accurately than previously.  

Timeliness measures for grants of representation are provided in FCSQ from application submission and document receipt. Document receipt occurs after payment has been made and all accompanying paperwork has been received by HMCTS. As such, it does not reflect the entire case journey from when an application is submitted by the user to when a grant is received. Instead these figures reflect the timeliness from when HMCTS staff are able to start working on the case. The aspects not included in these timeliness measures include (but are not limited to); time taken to scan and upload documents to the management system (for paper items), and check that these items are of good enough quality to proceed. For digital applications the receipt is instant but no work can start until the Will is sent to HMCTS.

Please note that the HMCTS database which collects information on probate changed in May 2019. However, due to the transition between the old and new systems, it was not possible to provide the breakdown by grant type and applicant type for quarter 2 of 2019 (and as such, for 2019 as a whole).

14. Data Sources and Data Quality

14.1 data sources.

The data on family related court cases is principally sourced from the court administrative system, FamilyMan, used by court staff for case management purposes. It contains good quality information about a case’s progress through the family courts.

For earlier years, FamilyMan provided data for county courts and for the Family Proceedings Courts which share premises and administrative systems with county courts; data for other Family Proceedings Courts was provided on electronic summary returns submitted to HMCTS Business Information Division on a monthly basis. Figures prior to 2007 for Family Proceedings Courts were weighted estimates based on data from a subset of courts. There are known data quality problems with these, which are likely to be an undercount. Starting at the end of 2009, an upgrade to the administrative system in all county courts and Family Proceedings Courts was rolled out nationally. This upgrade was completed in December 2010 following a staggered rollout. Therefore, the majority of the family court case data now comes from the FamilyMan system.

Whilst the Ministry of Justice’s divorce statistics are sourced directly from the main court system (FamilyMan originally, Core Case Data more recently), the ONS data used to be compiled from ‘D105’ forms used by the courts to record decrees absolute. There were small differences between the number of divorces as recorded by the two sets of statistics, and attempts were made to understand these differences and reconcile where possible. A joint statement was subsequently produced by the MoJ and ONS on the differences in these divorce statistics, which can be found at Annex C of the CSQ bulletin for Q1 2012 .

Core Case Data

In September 2016, a commitment was made to modernise courts through the HMCTS Reform programme . As a result, data transitions from the existing case management systems to the new Core Case Data (CCD) as different areas are addressed. Like FamilyMan, CCD is an administrative data system set up for case management purposes.

Probate figures from Q2 2019 onwards are extracted from CCD, which was implemented in May 2019. Earlier data was extracted from HMCTS’s OPT system, which utilised data from ProbateMan – a similar administrative system to FamilyMan.

Divorce has undergone reform, and data for digital cases is available directly via CCD whilst paper cases are bulk scanned in, and financial remedy case data has also migrated to CCD. Published statistics use a combination of both data systems, from June 2021 (for divorce) and March 2022 (for financial remedy).

A similar process will take place as other areas are reformed for public law, private law (including domestic violence remedy, FGM and forced marriage cases) and adoption. This section will be updated accordingly.

Other Data Sources

Information on Forced Marriage Protection Orders (FMPOs) and Female Genital Mutilation Protection Orders (FGMPOs) are sourced from the HMCTS Performance database (OPT) . This is a regularly updated, web-based management information system which enables aggregation to national level of returns from individual courts. It is based on systems similar to FamilyMan, that is court administrative systems used for case management.

Mental Capacity Act figures are provided directly to MoJ from the Court of Protection (CoP) and the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) from their data management systems. Information about Lasting Power of Attorney records (LPAs) is managed by OPG’s Sirius case management system, whilst deputyships are extracted from the Caserec system. Sirius is the first case management system in government developed using Government Digital Service principles; it is built with open source technologies, cloud hosted and maintained by teams in OPG.

A number of published breakdowns of OPG data are derived from recorded variables, as opposed to being recorded directly themselves. These are:

Gender of donor is inferred from the donor’s title. Cases within the “other” category relate to titles which cannot clearly be categorised as male or female (i.e. Dr, Professor etc), and where titles have additional characters/errors (i.e. Mrs., Mr’ etc).  Possible non-binary also appear in this category as it is unclear if these are non-binary titles or mistakes in spelling of a male/female title (i.e. Mx.);

Age of donor is calculated from the recorded date of birth and date of registration, and split into several bands. The ‘Other’ age is where the date of birth is recorded but we are unable to infer accurately (e.g. over 120 years old, has a negative age, under 18 years old).

Location of donor is inferred from the donor’s recorded address and classified into NSPL (ONS National Statistics Postcode Lookup) categories for country, region and local authority breakdowns.

14.2 Counting Rules

Here are some main points to consider when interpreting the family court statistics:

A disposal which occurs in one quarter or year may relate to an application which was initially made in an earlier period. Additionally, an application of one type may lead to an order of a different type being made.

As well as an order made, a disposal can be a refused order, withdrawn application, or order of no order.

There are several ways to analyse and count the data on family cases. By case – where each case number in FamilyMan is only counted once. By application or disposal - where each application or disposal is only counted once. Please note counting applications or disposals by type will not sum to the overall total as an application or disposal may include more than one type. By the number of children involved - the data on Public law and Private law proceedings is also analysed by the number of children which are subject to an application or disposal - for example, if two children are the subject of a single case then the children would be counted separately in those statistics. Different types of orders may be made in respect of different children involved in a case.

Breakdowns of many of the summary figures presented in FCSQ, such as splits by case type or by Designated Family Judge (DFJ) area, are available in the Comma Separated Value (csv) files that accompany the bulletin.

Symbols and conventions

The following symbols have been used throughout the tables in this bulletin:

.. = Not applicable

• = Not available

14.3 Data Quality

Family court statistics are published in compliance with the Ministry of Justice quality strategy, principles and processes for statistics , which states that information should be provided as to how the bulletin meets user needs.

Five principles (relevance, accuracy, timeliness, accessibility and clarity, comparability and coherence) are outlined. The Data Quality statement which accompanies this guide addresses how each are addressed in the FCSQ publications.

15. Accredited official statistics status

Accredited official statistics are called National Statistics in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007. These accredited official statistics were independently reviewed by the Office for Statistics Regulation in January 2019. They comply with the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics and should be labelled ‘accredited official statistics’.

It is the Ministry of Justice’s responsibility to maintain compliance with the standards expected for accredited official statistics. If we become concerned about whether these statistics are still meeting the appropriate standards, we will discuss any concerns with the Authority promptly. Accredited official statistics status can be removed at any point when the highest standards are not maintained, and reinstated when standards are restored.

The continued accreditation of these statistics as Accredited Official Statistics was confirmed in January 2019 [footnote 5] following a compliance check by the Office for Statistics Regulation. The statistics last underwent a full assessment against the Code of Practice in 2010 [footnote 6] when this information was previously published as part of the Court Statistics Quarterly collection.

Accreditation can be broadly interpreted to mean that the statistics:

meet identified user needs;

are well explained and readily accessible;

are produced according to sound methods, and

are managed impartially and objectively in the public interest.

Once statistics have been accredited as Accredited Official Statistics, it is a statutory requirement that the Code of Practice shall continue to be observed.

15.1 Revisions

In accordance with Principle 2 of the Code of Practice for Statistics, the Ministry of Justice is required to publish transparent guidance on its policy for revisions .

The three reasons specified for statistics needing to be revised are;

changes in sources of administrative systems or methodology changes

receipt of subsequent information, or

errors in statistical systems and processes.

Each of these points, and its specific relevance to the FCSQ publication, are addressed below.

Changes in source of administrative systems/methodology changes

The data within this publication come from a variety of administrative systems. This technical document will clearly present where there have been revisions to data due to changes in methodology or administrative systems. In addition, statistics affected within the publication will be appropriately footnoted or additional text included to explain and quantify the impact of said changes.

As the data underlying Family Court Statistics Quarterly (FCSQ) are extracted from a live administrative database, figures are subject to revision in future publications. For tables that use information from the FamilyMan or CCD systems, data are extracted for the full timeseries within each bulletin. Minimal changes (i.e. a handful of cases) may be observed in earlier years, whilst larger changes are seen in the most recent quarters as cases progress further through the system. This is especially relevant for case progression tables (Tables 8-10).

Receipt of subsequent information

The nature of any administrative system is that data may be amended or received late. For the purpose of FCSQ, late or amended data of any previously published periods will be incorporated to reflect the up to date ‘live’ FamilyMan or CCD databases, as described in the revisions section above.

Errors in statistical systems and processes

Occasionally errors can occur in statistical processes; procedures are constantly reviewed to minimise this risk. Should a significant error be found, the publication on the website will be updated and appropriate notifications documenting the revision will be made.

16. Users of the statistics

Official statistics are used by a wide range of individuals and organisations, and their value lies in their wide and informed use. The main users of these statistics are Ministers and officials in central government responsible for developing policy regarding family justice. Other users include the central government departments, and various voluntary organisations with an interest in family justice. The data also feeds into statistics produced by the Office for National Statistics, such as public-sector productivity and the Domestic Violence in England and Wales bulletin .

We routinely consult with policy and operational colleagues to refresh our understanding of core uses for the data, promote the release and provide support to known users.  We seek comments from external users and maintain dialogue with public users via a dedicated email account that is included in this guide and in every bulletin and accompanying data visualisation tool for feedback on the commentary and any additional wider feedback or queries.

17. Legislation coming into effect in the reporting period

The legislation described below relates mainly to legislation that came into force since 2000. It is only a brief summary of the sections that may have affected the published statistics. Details of all legislation that has come into force in the intervening period can be found on the government website .

The coverage of the statistics in this publication may have been affected by the following legislation:

Adoption and Children Act 2002

Civil Partnership Act 2004

Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004

Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012

Crime and Courts Act 2013

Children and Families Act 2014

Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014

Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020

Domestic Abuse Act 2021

17.1 Adoption and Children Act 2002

The Adoption and Children Act 2002 was implemented on 30 December 2005, replacing the Adoption Act 1976. It made amendments to the law in relation to the adoption of children. The first stage of the Act deals with Local Authorities duties to provide an adoption service and support services. The second stage relating to inter-country adoptions and the third stage relates to Adoption Support Services. Changes to parental responsibility and the adopted children register were also made. The key changes resulting from the new act were the:

alignment of adoption law with the Children Act 1989 to ensure that the child’s welfare is the most important consideration when making decisions;

provision for adoption orders to be made in favour of unmarried couples;

the introduction of Special Guardianship Orders, intended to provide permanence for children for whom adoption is not appropriate.

17.2 Civil Partnership Act 2004

The Civil Partnership Act 2004 grants civil partnerships in the United Kingdom with rights and responsibilities identical to civil marriage. Civil Partners are entitled to the same property rights as married opposite-sex couples, the same exemption as married couples with regard to social security and pension benefits, and also the ability to get parental responsibility for a partner’s children, as well as responsibility for reasonable maintenance of one’s partner and their children, tenancy rights, full life insurance recognition, next-of-kin rights in hospitals, and others. There is a formal process for dissolving partnerships akin to divorce.

17.3 Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004

The Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 concentrates upon legal protection and assistance to victims of crime, particularly domestic violence.

17.4 Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007

The Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007 seeks to assist victims of forced marriage, or those threatened with forced marriage, by providing civil remedies. The Act created the forced marriage protection order (FMPO). A person threatened with forced marriage can apply to court for a forced marriage protection order. The court can then order a range of appropriate provisions to prevent the forced marriage from taking place, or to protect a victim of forced marriage from its effects, and may include such measures as confiscation of passport or restrictions on contact with the victim.

The subject of a forced marriage protection order can be not just the person to whom the forced marriage will occur, but also any other person who aids, abets or encourages the forced marriage. A marriage can be considered forced not merely on the grounds of threats of physical violence to the victim, but also through threats of physical violence to third parties (for example, the victim’s family), or even self-violence (for example, marriage procured through threat of suicide.) A person who violates a forced marriage protection order is subject to contempt of court proceedings and may be arrested.

17.5 Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012

Following the introduction of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 on 1 April 2013, the scope of services funded as part of civil legal aid changed. For family law, the general position is that Public law proceedings and the representation of children remain in scope under Part 1, Schedule 1 of LASPO. However, most private family law cases involving children or finance remain in scope only where there are issues concerning domestic violence or child abuse and specific evidence fulfilling the requirements of regulation 33 or 34 of the Procedure Regulations is provided in support of this.

17.6 Crime and Courts Act 2013

The Crime and Courts Act 2013 established the single Family Court, replacing the previous three-tiered system under which cases were heard in family proceedings courts, Country Courts and the High Court. 

17.7 Children and Families Act 2014

The Children and Families Act 2014 made a number of changes affecting Public law family cases. In particular, it introduced a 26 week time limit for completing care and supervision cases. It gave the family court the discretion to extend cases by up to 8 weeks at a time should that be necessary to resolve proceedings justly.  The Act also removed the need to review interim care orders and interim supervision orders as frequently, allowing the courts to set interim orders in line with the timetable for the case.  In relation to Private law matters, the Act introduced a ‘child arrangements order’, replacing residence and contact orders.  It also removed the requirement for the court to consider arrangements for children as part of the court processes for divorce and dissolution of a civil partnership. 

17.8 Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014

The Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 came into force on 16 June 2014 and made it an offence to force a person to marry against their will, or to breach a FMPO.

17.9 Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020

The Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020, which amends existing laws relating to divorce to allow for no-fault divorce in England and Wales. It came into effect from 6th April 2022.

17.10 Domestic Abuse Act 2021

The Domestic Abuse Act 2021 has created a single domestic abuse protection order to unify the current civil law protection orders. Most of the provisions in the Act came into force during 2021 and 2022.

18. Directory of Related Internet Websites on the Family Court

The following list of web sites contains information in the form of publications and/or statistics relating to the family justice system that may be of interest.

Ministry of Justice This site provides information on the organisations within the justice system, reports and data, and guidance.

Ministry of Justice Statistical and Research publications :  Most of the publications can be viewed online.

Attorney General’s Office : Provides information on the role of the department including new releases; updates; reports; reviews and links to other law officer’s departments and organisations.

Welsh Assembly Government : Gives information on all aspects of the Welsh Assembly together with details of publications and statistics.

Scottish Government : Gives information on all aspects of the Scottish Executive together with details of publications and statistics.

UK National Statistics Publication Hub : This is the UK’s home of official statistics, reflecting Britain’s economy, population and society at national and local level. There are links to the Office for National Statistics and the UK Statistics Authority.

Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (CAFCASS) : A non-departmental public body set up to promote the welfare of children and families involved in family court.

The Nuffield Foundation has established a Family Justice Observatory that will support the best possible decisions for children by improving the use of data and research evidence in the family justice system in England and Wales.

19. Glossary

19.1 application.

The act of asking the court to make an order. For divorce cases (previously a petition), an application for a conditional order.

19.2 Child Arrangements Order

A child arrangements order regulates the arrangements for who a child is to live with, spend time with or otherwise have contact with when parents separate. It effectively combines residence and contact orders and reduces the feeling that one parent has more say in the upbringing of the child because they have a residence order.  The order contains a warning notice about failure to comply with the order and will be subject to enforcement in the same way as a contact order is currently. The child arrangements order replaced residence orders and contact orders from 22 April 2014.

19.3 Conditional Order (previously Decree Nisi)

This is the first order made in divorce proceedings and is given when the court is satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for granting the divorce. It is used to apply for a decree absolute.

19.4 Convention Adoption

An adoption carried out under the terms of The Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption. This is an international treaty designed to protect children from child trafficking and requires signatory countries to establish safeguards to ensure that any inter-country adoption is in the child’s best interests.

19.5 Decree Absolute

This is the final order made in divorce proceedings that can be applied for six weeks and one day after a decree nisi has been given. Once this is received, the couple are no longer legally married and are free to remarry. Under the new divorce law, this is known as the final order.

19.6 Decree Nisi

This is the first order made in divorce proceedings and is given when the court is satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for granting the divorce. It is used to apply for a decree absolute. Under the new divorce law, this is known as the conditional order.

19.7 Deputyships

A Deputy (OPG) is legally responsible for acting and making decisions on behalf of a person who lacks capacity to make decisions for themselves. The Deputy order sets out specific powers in relation to the person who lacks capacity.

19.8 Dissolution

The legal termination of a marriage by a decree of divorce, nullity or presumption of death or of a civil partnership by the granting of a dissolution order.

19.9 Digital divorce

Where a divorce has been dealt with digitally by a Courts and Tribunal Service Centre at all stages of the divorce process.

19.10 Divorce

This is the legal ending of a marriage.

19.11 Enduring Power of Attorney (EPA)

An EPA is a legal document that allows someone (the ‘donor’) to appoint one or more people (known as ‘attorneys’) to make decisions about their property or money, at a time in the future when they either lack the mental capacity or no longer wish to make those decisions themselves. EPAs were replaced by lasting powers of attorney on 1st October 2007. Only EPAs made and signed before this date can still be used.

19.12 Final Order (previously Decree Absolute)

This is the final order made in divorce proceedings that can be applied for six weeks and one day after a conditional order has been given. Once this is received, the couple are no longer legally married and are free to remarry.

19.13 Financial Remedy

Formerly known as Ancillary Relief. This refers to different types of order used to settle financial disputes during divorce proceedings. Examples include: periodical payments, pension sharing, property adjustment and lump sums, and they can be made in favour of either the former spouse or the couple’s children.

19.14 Judicial Separation

This is a type of order that does not dissolve a marriage but absolves the parties from the obligation to live together. This procedure might, for instance, be used if religious beliefs forbid or discourage divorce.

19.15 Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA)

An LPA is a legal document that allows someone (the ‘donor’) to appoint one or more people (known as ‘attorneys’), that they trust to make decisions on their behalf, at a time in the future when they either lack the mental capacity or no longer wish to make those decisions themselves.

19.16 Non-molestation Order

This is a type of civil injunction used in domestic violence cases. It prevents the applicant and/or any relevant children from being molested by someone who has previously been violent towards them. Since July 2007, failing to obey the restrictions of these orders has been a criminal offence for which someone could be arrested.

19.17 Nullity

This is where a marriage is ended by being declared not valid. This can either be because the marriage was void (not allowed by law) or because the marriage was voidable (the marriage was legal but there are circumstances that mean it can be treated as if it never took place).

19.18 Occupation Order

This is a type of civil injunction used in domestic violence cases. It restricts the right of a violent partner to enter or live in a shared home.

19.19 Order

The document bearing the seal of the court recording its decision in a case. Some examples of orders are below:

Care orders

A care order brings the child into the care of the applicant local authority and cannot be made in favour of any other party. The care order gives the local authority parental responsibility for the child and gives the local authority the power to determine the extent to which the child’s parents and others with parental responsibility (who do not lose their parental responsibility on the making of the order) may meet their responsibility. The making of a care order, with respect to a child who is the subject of any section 8 order, discharges that order.

Supervision orders

A supervision order places the child under the supervision of the local authority or probation officer. While a supervision order is in force, it is the duty of the supervisor to advise, assist and befriend the child and take the necessary action to give effect to the order, including whether or not to apply for its variation or discharge

Emergency Protection Orders

An emergency protection order is used to secure the immediate safety of a child by removing the child to a place of safety, or by preventing the child’s removal from a place of safety. Anyone, including a local authority, can apply for an emergency protection order if, for example, they believe that access to the child is being unreasonably refused.

19.20 Petition (for divorce)

An application for a decree nisi or a judicial separation order. Under the new divorce law, this is known as the application.

19.21 Private Law

Refers to Children Act 1989 cases where two or more parties are trying to resolve a private dispute. This is commonly where parents have split-up and there is a disagreement about who their children should live with and who their children should have contact with, or otherwise spend time with and when.

19.22 Public Law

Refers to Children Act 1989 cases where there are child welfare issues and a local authority, or an authorised person, is stepping in to protect the child and ensure they get the care they need.

Section 8 orders: Under the Children Act 1989, Section 8 orders refer to child arrangement orders (contact and residence), prohibited steps and specific issue orders.

20. Contacts

Enquiries about this guide should be directed to the Data and Analysis: Courts and People division of the MoJ:

Carly Gray, Head of Access to Justice Data and Statistics

Email: [email protected]

General information about the official statistics system of the UK is available from www.statistics.gov.uk

Press enquiries should be directed to the Ministry of Justice press office:

Tel: 020 3334 3536

https://web.archive.org/web/20081208061525/http://www.haringey.gov.uk:80/index/news_and_events/latest_news/childa.htm   ↩

Under the Children Act 1989, Section 8 orders refer to child arrangement orders (contact and residence), prohibited steps and specific issue orders.  ↩

As from the publication of the January to March 2017 bulletin.  ↩

P v Cheshire West and Chester Council and P and Q v Surrey County Council [2014] UKSC 19  ↩

https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/correspondence/compliance-check-on-court-statistics/   ↩

https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/statistics-on-court-activity/   ↩

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Reasons for Divorce and Recollections of Premarital Intervention: Implications for Improving Relationship Education

Shelby b. scott.

Department of Psychology, University of Denver

Galena K. Rhoades

Scott m. stanley, elizabeth s. allen.

Department of Psychology, University of Colorado – Denver

Howard J. Markman

The study presents findings from interviews of 52 divorced individuals who received the Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program (PREP) while engaged to be married. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, the study sought to understand participant reasons for divorce (including identification of the “final straw”) in order to understand if the program covered these topics effectively. Participants also provided suggestions based on their premarital education experiences so as to improve future relationship education efforts. The most commonly reported major contributors to divorce were lack of commitment, infidelity, and conflict/arguing. The most common “final straw” reasons were infidelity, domestic violence, and substance use. More participants blamed their partners than blamed themselves for the divorce. Recommendations from participants for the improvement of premarital education included receiving relationship education before making a commitment to marry (when it would be easier to break-up), having support for implementing skills outside of the educational setting, and increasing content about the stages of typical marital development. These results provide new insights into the timing and content of premarital and relationship education.

Divorced individuals, compared to their married counterparts, have higher levels of psychological distress, substance abuse, and depression, as well as lower levels of overall health ( Amato, 2000 ; Hughes & Waite, 2009 ). Marital conflict and divorce have also shown to be associated with negative child outcomes including lower academic success ( Frisco, Muller, & Frank, 2007 ; Sun & Li, 2001 ), poorer psychological well-being (Sun & Li, 2002), and increased depression and anxiety ( Strohschein, 2005 ). Given these negative outcomes of marital conflict and divorce, the overarching goal of premarital relationship education has been to provide couples with skills to have healthy marriages.

The Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program (PREP; Markman, Stanley, & Blumberg, 2010 ) focuses on teaching appropriate communication and conflict skills, and provides information to help couples evaluate expectations, understand relationship commitment, and enhance positive connections through friendship and fun ( Ragan, Einhorn, Rhoades, Markman, & Stanley, 2009 ). Most research indicates that compared to control groups, PREP helps couples learn to communicate more positively and less negatively (e.g., Laurenceau, Stanley, Olmos-Gallo, Baucom, & Markman, 2004 ; Markman, Renick, Floyd, Stanley, & Clements, 1993 ), increases satisfaction, and reduces risk for divorce in the years following the program (e.g., Hahlweg, Markman, Thurmaier, Engl, & Eckert, 1998 ; Hahlweg & Richter, 2010 ; Markman & Hahlweg, 1993 ; Stanley, Allen, Markman, Rhoades, & Prentice, 2010 ). A few studies have shown more mixed or moderated results (e.g., Baucom, Hahlweg, Atkins, Engl, & Thurmaier, 2006 ; van Widenfelt, Hosman, Schaap, & van der Staak, 1996 ; Markman, Rhoades, Stanley, & Peterson, in press ). In an evidence-based tradition, the growing knowledge base can and should be used to generate insights about how to refine future efforts ( Stanley & Markman, 1998 ). One methodology that could improve PREP is to interview divorced individuals who participated in the program about their reasons for divorce and premarital education experiences in order to understand if the program covered these topics effectively.

Few studies have directly examined retrospective reports of reasons for divorce, particularly within the past two decades (see Bloom, Niles, & Tatcher, 1985 ; Gigy & Kelly, 1992 ; Kitson & Holmes, 1992 ; Thurnher, Fenn, Melichar, & Chiriboga, 1983 ) and no study, to our knowledge, has examined reasons for divorce in a sample of individuals who participated in the same relationship education program. Within a sample of divorcing parents, Hawkins, Willoughby, and Doherty (2012) found that the most endorsed reasons for divorce from a list of possible choices were growing apart (55%), not being able to talk together (53%), and how one’s spouse handled money (40%). Amato and Previti (2003) found that when divorced individuals were asked open-endedly to provide their reasons for divorce, the most cited reasons were infidelity (21.6%), incompatibility (19.2%), and drinking or drug use (10.6%). A statewide survey in Oklahoma found that the most commonly checked reasons for divorce from a list of choices were lack of commitment (85%), too much conflict or arguing (61%), and/or infidelity or extramarital affairs (58%; C. A. Johnson et al., 2001 ). International studies have found highly endorsed reasons for divorce to be marrying too young, communication problems, incompatibility, spousal abuse, drug and alcohol use, religious differences, failures to get along, lack of love, lack of commitment, and childlessness, to name a few ( Al Gharaibeh & Bromfield, 2012 ; Savaya & Cohen, 2003a , 2003b ; Mbosowo, 1994 ).

In sum, across studies some consistency exists regarding the importance of issues such as communication, incompatibility, and commitment as reasons for divorce, while other issues seem to vary across samples. Thus, it would be helpful to understand the reasons for divorce in former PREP participants in order to highlight specific areas that the program could have addressed better and in order to improve that program’s effectiveness. In addition, no study, to our knowledge, has asked divorced participants who all participated in the same premarital program to provide suggestions for improving relationship education programs based on their own experiences in the program and considering that their marriages ended in divorce. These results could be valuable for practitioners to consider in order to improve the PREP model specifically and relationship education efforts more generally. The current study qualitatively interviewed individuals who had completed PREP and later divorced about their premarital education, including what they wished would have been covered, as well as their marital experiences, particularly regarding their reasons for divorce. Therefore, this study sought to understand both participants’ reasons for divorce as well as how they thought relationship education could have better addressed their needs. The ultimate goal of the current study was to provide new knowledge on potential ways to help relationship education best prevent marital distress and divorce.

Participants

Data were collected from 52 individuals who received PREP premaritally but subsequently divorced at some point in the following 14 years. These individuals were all initially participants of a larger study of the effectiveness of premarital education ( N = 306 couples; Markman et al., 2004 ; Stanley et al., 2001 ). All participants in the current study either received PREP through the religious organization ( n = 24) that performed their weddings or PREP through a university ( n = 28). The sample included 31 women and 21 men. Of these, 18 men and 18 women had been married to each other (we were unable to assess the former spouse of the other 16 individuals). At the first time point of the larger study (i.e., the premarital assessment), these participants were 25.4 years old on average ( SD = 6.67), with a median education of 14 years, and median income of $20,000–29,999. At the time of the post-divorce interview, the average age was 37.2 ( SD = 6.5), the median education level was 16 years, and 32 of the participants (61.5%) had a least one child. The average number of years since premarital intervention to the post-divorce interview was 12.2 years, and the average number of years from finalized divorce to participating in the interview was 5.2 years. The sample was 88.2% Caucasian, 5.9% Native American, 3.9% Black, and 2.0% Asian; 1 participant did not report race. In terms of ethnicity, 84.3% of the sample identified as Non-Hispanic and 15.7% as Hispanic.

Couples ( N = 306) were recruited for the larger study through the religious organizations that would later perform their wedding services. At the initial wave of the study in 1996, participants were required to be planning marriage with someone of the opposite sex and needed to participate as a couple. As mentioned earlier, they were assigned to either receive PREP through the religious organization, PREP at a university, or naturally-occurring services. Throughout the duration of the larger study, participants were asked to complete annual assessments that included questionnaires and videotaped discussions. If a participant expressed that he/she was divorced or currently divorcing throughout the larger study, this information was recorded. From 2010–2012, we attempted to contact all divorced participants ( n = 114 individuals) to ask if they would participate in the current study. Of these individuals, we were unable to contact 35 participants, 18 declined an invitation to participate, and 1 participant was deceased. Participants who divorced and had received naturally-occurring services ( n = 8) were excluded from these analyses because we could not know exactly what premarital services they had received. There were no significant differences between divorced individuals who participated in this study compared to divorced individuals who did not participate across age at marriage, ethnicity, personal income, or relationship adjustment at the premarital assessment ( p s > .05).

All participants completed an individual 30-minute audio-recorded interview over the phone about their divorce and their recollections of their premarital intervention. They received $50 for participating in this interview. All interviews were transcribed verbatim for analyses. All study procedures were approved by a university Institutional Review Board.

Reasons for divorce

Using items from a previous survey on reasons for divorce ( C. A. Johnson et al., 2001 ) participants were asked to indicate whether or not each item on a list of common problems in relationships was a “major contributor to their divorce” (“yes” or “no”). These items included lack of commitment, infidelity/extra-marital affairs, too much arguing or conflict, substance abuse, domestic violence, economic hardship, lack of support from family members, marrying too young, little or no premarital education, and religious differences.

Qualitative feedback on progression of divorce

If participants indicated any of the reasons for divorce, they were subsequently asked to elaborate on how this problem progressed to their eventual divorce by the questions “Considering the problems you were telling me such as [the major reasons for divorce the participant listed], how did they move from problems to actually getting a divorce?” and “You said that [cited reason] was major contributor to the divorce. Can you tell me more about that?” We will only present detailed results from this qualitative feedback on reasons for divorce that were endorsed by at least 20% of participants.

Final straw

Participants were also asked if there was a “final straw” to their relationship ending, and to expand on that reason if there was one.

Who should have worked harder?

Participants were asked two questions ( C. A. Johnson et al., 2001 ): “Again looking back at your divorce, do you ever wish that you, yourself, had worked harder to save your marriage?” (with response options of “Yes, I wish I had worked harder” or “No, I worked hard enough.”) and “Do you ever wish that your spouse had worked harder to save your marriage?” (with response options of “Yes, I wish my spouse had worked harder.” or “No, my spouse worked hard enough.”)

Qualitative feedback on PREP

Participants were asked to report and elaborate on what they remembered, found difficult, or wished was different about their premarital education experience in an open-ended format. Example questions from the interviews include “What do you remember about the premarital preparation or training you and your ex-spouse took part in?” and “Based on your experience in a marriage that didn’t work out as you planned, do you think there is any kind of information or education that would have made a difference in how things turned out?”

Analytic Approach

Both quantitative and qualitative approaches were utilized to address our research questions. For the first phase of analysis, answers were counted for close-ended questions, such as the list of major reasons for divorce (see Table 1 ) and if there was a “final straw” (yes or no). For open-ended questions, we followed a grounded-theory methodology ( Creswell, 2006 ; Strauss & Corbin, 1998 ). For the first phase of coding, after repeated readings of the transcripts, two coders, including the first author and a research assistant from the larger project, followed a grounded-theory methodology to generate common themes related to participants’ recollections of their premarital education and reasons for divorce (from open-ended items; Creswell, 2006 ; Strauss & Corbin, 1998 ). The two coders then met repeatedly to compare results and to establish consistency. If the coders disagreed across codes, they discussed their codes with the second author to come to a conclusion. Next, axial coding was used to analyze how different codes vary in order to create specific categories of the individual codes ( Creswell, 2006 ; Strauss & Corbin, 1998 ). For example, axial coding involved examining how respondent reports of general themes (e.g., communication problems) varied in their presentation (e.g., communication problems throughout the relationship vs. communication problems only at the end of marriage).

List of Major Reasons for Divorce by Individuals and Couples Who Participated in PREP

Note. The individuals column reflects the percentage of individuals in the total sample who said yes to each reason. The couples column reflects the percentage of couples who had at least one partner say yes to each reason. The couple agreement column represents how many couples had both partners cite each reason out of the couples that had a least one partner mention that reason.

The final stage of coding included selective coding in which categories were refined and relationships between concepts were noted, such as how reasons for divorce related to difficulties utilizing PREP skills. Once all codes were determined, the first author and a new coder, another research assistant on the project, coded all transcripts with the established coding system. Codes were counted for all individuals, as well as couples as a whole (partner agreement on the same code) and couples in which only one partner from the relationship reported a specific code (partner disagreement on the same code). The average Cohen’s Kappa (per code) was .71 ( SD = .28) and the median was .80.

Analyses are presented at the individual level by using data from all 52 participants, as well as at the couple level by using data from the 18 couples ( n = 36) in which both partners completed interviews.

Reasons for Divorce

Table 1 presents the “major contributors for divorce” list. Overall, the results indicate that the most often cited reasons for divorce at the individual level were lack of commitment (75.0%), infidelity (59.6%), and too much conflict and arguing (57.7%), followed by marrying too young (45.1%), financial problems (36.7%), substance abuse (34.6%), and domestic violence (23.5%). Other problems, such as religious differences, were endorsed less than 20% of the time. The order of these rankings was essentially identical at the couple level, although rates of endorsement increased because both partners were reporting. The following provides qualitative elaborations by participants on these specific reasons for divorce.

Results indicated that the most common major contributing factor to divorce reported by participants was lack of commitment , reported by 75% of individuals and by at least one person in 94.4% of couples. Of the couples in which at least one partner mentioned commitment as a problem, 70.6% represented couples in which both partners agreed that lack of commitment was a major reason for divorce. Some participants reported that commitment within their relationships gradually eroded until there was not enough commitment to sustain the relationship, while others reported more drastic drops in commitment in response to negative events, such as infidelity.

“I realized it was the lack of commitment on my part because I didn’t really feel romantic towards him. I always had felt more still like he was a friend to me.” “It became insurmountable. It got to a point where it seemed like he was no longer really willing to work [on the relationship]. All of the stresses together and then what seemed to me to be an unwillingness to work through it any longer was the last straw for me.”

The next most often cited major contributing factor to divorce was infidelity , endorsed by 59.6% of individuals and by at least one partner in 88.8% of couples. Of those couples who had a least one partner report infidelity as a reason for divorce, only 31.3% represented couples in which both partners agreed that infidelity was a major contributor to the dissolution of their marriage. Thus, the majority of couples with apparent infidelity in their relationships only had one partner mention it as a contributing factor to their divorce. Overall, infidelity was often cited as a critical turning point in a deteriorating relationship.

“It was the final straw when he actually admitted to cheating on me. I kind of had a feeling about it, but, you know, I guess we all deny [because] we never think that the person you are married to or care about would do that to us.” “He cheated on me […] Then I met somebody else and did the same thing. […] And when he found out about it we both essentially agreed that it wasn’t worth trying to make it work anymore because it just hurt too bad.”

Conflict and arguing

Too much conflict and arguing was endorsed by 57.7% of individuals and 72.2% of couples had at least one partner report that was a major contributor to divorce. Of these couples, 53.8% of couples agreed that too much conflict and arguing was a contributor to divorce. Overall, participants indicated that conflicts were not generally resolved calmly or effectively. Respondents also reported that such communication problems increased in frequency and intensity throughout their marriages, which at times, seemed to coincide with lost feelings of positive connections and mutual support. By the end of the marriage, these respondents indicated that there was a significant lack of effective communication.

“I got frustrated of arguing too much.” “We’d have an argument over something really simple and it would turn into just huge, huge fights […] and so our arguments never got better they only ever got worse.”

Marrying too young

Getting married too young was reported as a major contributing factor to divorce by 45.1% of individuals and by at least one partner from 61.1% of couples. Both partners mentioned this reason in 27.3% of these couples. Participants who endorsed this item were an average of 23.3 years old at the time of marriage ( SD = 5.5) and participants who did not endorse this item were 29.2 ( SD = 6.7). In commenting about this issue, some participants reported that they had only known their partners for short periods of time before their marriage and/or that they wished they had dated their partners longer in order to either gain a better perspective on the relationship or to make a more rational decision as to whom they should marry. Additional comments about this issue included reports that participants were too young to make mature objective decisions regarding their marriage decisions.

“The main reason [we divorced] was because of our age. I think that being 19 at the time we got married, it just didn’t take. I think that we didn’t take anything as seriously as we should have.” “I wish that we wouldn’t have […] gotten married so young. I wish we would have waited a little bit longer before we actually got married.”

Financial problems

Financial problems were cited as a major contributor to divorce by 36.7% of participants and by at least one partner from 55.6% of couples. Of couples who had at least one partner endorse financial problems as a contributor to divorce, 50% represented couples in which both partners agreed that financial problems were a major reason for divorce. In elaborating about this issue, some participants indicated that financial difficulties were not the most pertinent reason for their divorce, but instead contributed to increased stress and tension within the relationship. Other participants also expressed that some financial difficulties were linked to other problems (e.g., health problems, substance abuse).

“I had a severe illness for almost a year and I was the only employed person [before that] so obviously money ran very short.” “The stress of trying to figure out the finances became a wedge that was really insurmountable.”

Substance abuse

Substance abuse was reported as a major contributing factor to divorce by 34.6% of participants, and by at least one partner in 50% of couples. Of these couples, only 33.3% of partners agreed that substance abuse was a major contributing factor to divorce. Thus, similar to reports of infidelity, the majority of couples who listed substance abuse as a reason for divorce had only one partner cite this reason. Generally, participants expressed that the severity of the substance abuse problem in their relationship was either minimized over the duration of the relationship, or if attempts to address the problem were made, the partner with the substance abuse problem would not improve and/or seek help. After several attempts to address the problem, the relationship finally ended.

“I said ‘absolutely no more bars’ and as soon as I found out he was back in them, I asked for [a divorce].” “He never admitted that he even drank. It wasn’t me against him. It was me against him and the disease.”

Domestic violence

Domestic violence was cited as a contributing factor to divorce by 23.5% of participants and by at least one partner from 27.8% of couples. Of those couples in which one partner listed domestic abuse a major contributor to divorce, 40.0% of partners agreed that it was a major contributor to divorce. Elaborations of this item included descriptions of both physical and emotional abuse. Participants often expressed how the abuse in their relationship developed gradually, with intensified cycles of abuse and contrition, until the severity of the abuse intensified to insurmountable levels.

“[There was] continuous sexual abuse and emotional trauma which only got worse over time.” “There were times that I felt very physically threatened. There was a time that there was a bit of shoving. I got an elbow to my nose and I got a nose bleed. Then there was another time that he literally just slid me along the floor. […]We’d work on it. It would happen again.”

Final Straw

After assessing participant major reasons for divorce, we were interested to see if participants indicated a single event or reason that constituted a “final straw” in the process of their marriage dissolution. Overall, 68.6% of participants and at least one partner in 88.9% of couples reported that there was a final straw leading to the end of their marriage. General themes of final straw issues where generated through qualitative methods for participants who reported a final straw. Of the individuals who indicated that there was a final straw involved in ending their marriages, the most common cited reason was infidelity, which was reported by 24% of these participants, followed by domestic violence (21.2%) and substance abuse (12.1%). At the couple level, no couples (0%) had both partners report the same reason for the final straw. Participants expressed that although these final straw events may not have been the first incident of their kind (e.g., the first time they realized their partner had a substance abuse problem) an event involving these behaviors led to the final decision for their relationship to end. Also, there were some situations in which individuals expressed that these three issues may have interacted with one another or other relationship issues.

“[My ex-husband] and I both had substance abuse problems which led to infidelity […] which also led to domestic violence”. “Along with him having alcohol and drug issues as well as infidelity issues [and] the stress, came the physical and verbal abuse.”

Who is to Blame?

Considering that infidelity, domestic violence, and substance abuse were the most often endorsed “final straw” reasons for divorce, we were interested in deciphering which member of the relationship participants saw as responsible for these behaviors. In examining participants’ elaborations of infidelity, substance abuse, and domestic violence, we found that 76.9%, 72.2%, and 77.8%, respectively, described these events in terms of their partner engaging in these negative behaviors, and only 11.5%, 11.1%, and 0%, respectively, volunteered that they engaged in the behavior themselves.

Furthermore, when participants were asked if their partner should have worked harder to save their marriages, 65.8% of men and 73.8% of women believe that their ex-spouse should have worked harder to save their marriages. Conversely, when participants were asked if they, personally, should have worked harder to save their marriages, only 31.6% of men and 33.3% of women expressed that they, personally, should have worked harder. Further, at the couple level, 70.6% of couples showed a pattern in which the women believed their ex-husbands should have worked harder to save their relationships while their ex-husbands did not believe they, themselves, should have worked harder. Only 11.7% agreed that the husband should have worked harder and 11.7% had the husband endorse that he should have worked harder with the wife disagreeing. Conversely, only 35.3% of couples displayed the pattern in which the men blamed their ex-wives for not working harder while their ex-wives, themselves, denied that they should have worked harder. Only 11.7% agreed that the wife should have worked harder and 17.7% had the wife endorsed that she should have worked harder with her husband disagreeing. Further, 35.3% of couples agreed that the wife had not needed to work harder to save the marriage, while only 5.9% of couples agreed that the husband had not needed to work harder. Thus, most participants believed their ex-partners should have worked harder, but at the couple level, there were more couples in which both partners agreed that the wife did not need to work harder than there were couples in which both partners agreed the husband did not need to work harder. When asked who filed for the divorce, 63.5% of participants indicated that the woman filed for divorce and only 25% participants indicated that the man filed for divorce.

Feedback on PREP

Next, we provide the findings on the most commonly cited qualitative feedback reported by participants regarding how to improve premarital education. The following results and percentages refer to counts of qualitative codes created by the research team based on common themes in the interviews.

Learning more about one’s partner

Results show that 42.3% of participants and 77.8% of couples expressed that they wished they had known more about their ex-spouse before they were married. Of these couples, 28.6% of partners agreed. These statements included desires to understand their partner better in order to improve their communication and better prepare for the marriage, or conversely, information that would have led them to never marry one’s partner in the first place. Indeed, 30.8% of participants specifically mentioned that they wished they had recognized “red flags” to leave the relationship before they entered their marriage.

“I think the only information that could have [helped] would’ve been information that might have led me to not marry him.” “I probably wish that we would have had more premarital counseling and had somebody tell us we should not be getting married.”

Participating in the program before constraints to marry

Twenty-five percent (25.0%) of participants specifically reported that they were influenced by constraints to stay in the relationship already in place during the program. Example constraints included having become engaged, set a wedding date, sent out invitations, or purchased a dress, which made it difficult for participants to objectively reconsider if they were marrying the right person through the educational experience. Thus, a large portion of participants expressed that receiving PREP just before marriage made it difficult for them to seriously considered delaying their wedding plans in order to make more objective decisions about the relationship.

“It was one of those things where you’re like, ‘Well, I already have the dress. We’re already getting married. We already have all the people. Everything is already set up and we bought the house.’ And you just kind of think, ‘Well you know I’m sure things will get better.’ You see the red flags but you kind of ignore them.” “I just didn’t have the guts to say, ‘You know what, I understand the dresses have been paid for. The churches have been booked. The invitations have gone out. But I don’t think I want to do this.’”

Improved support for ongoing implementation

Thirty-one percent (30.8%) of individuals and 38.9% of couples had at least one partner express that, although they found PREP skills helpful during the duration of the program, they had difficulty using these skills in their daily lives outside of their premarital education classes. Of these couples, 42.9% of partners agreed that they had difficulty implementing program skills in their marriage. In general, these participants expressed that, in the heat of the moment, it was hard to utilize their communication skills, such as staying calm, actively listening, working toward the problem as a team, or taking “time outs” as suggested in PREP. Other participants simply expressed that it was hard to remember and perfect their skills after the program ended because they did not practice them regularly.

“I think that the techniques […] were helpful. I just think it mattered if you were going to apply the principles or not. And I don’t think a lot of them were applied.” “It helped with discussion and listening tools. I think, it’s just the follow through, you know. We didn’t remember those things when it came down to it.” “He tried to use it at the beginning, but it was just the continual using of the techniques that were given to us.”

Education regarding the realities of marriage

In addition to not knowing enough about one’s partner, 48.1% of participants and 72.2% of couples expressed that they did not know enough about the realities or stages of marriage after participating in the program. Of these couples, 38.5% of partners agreed. These comments included surprise that their partners changed over the course of the marriage, as well as trouble facing new problems when they emerged (e.g., lack of attraction/connection, decreases in commitment and satisfaction, and new abuse problems).

“Premarital counseling teaches you how you get along, and that you should communicate, but it doesn’t really talk about the phases of a marriage over time.” “[I wish I had learned] that the biggest area in life in an ongoing relationship is knowing that things are going to come up that aren’t perfect. That after the wedding day, and the build up to the wedding day, real life is going to kick in and you have to really have some tools to deal with it.”

The goal of this study was to increase understanding of divorced individuals’ perspectives on whether their premarital education prepared them for marriage and how relationship education could be modified to better address couples’ needs. Thus, among individuals who received PREP premaritally and later divorced, this study addressed reasons for divorce as well as ideas for what else would have been helpful in relationship education. It is the first study to qualitatively assess divorced participants’ recommendations for relationship education services. Given the small sample and qualitative nature of the reports, the implications discussed below ought to be considered preliminary.

We asked about reasons for divorce to know whether PREP addressed the kinds of problems that couples who went on to divorce tended to experience. The most commonly cited reason for divorce was lack of commitment, followed by infidelity and too much conflict and arguing. These top rated major reasons for divorce noted here are similar to those found in large random surveys of divorced participants (cf. C. A. Johnson et al., 2001 ; Hawkins, Willoughby et al., 2012 ). Overall, these findings support the importance of covering communication and commitment in premarital education programs to help foster successful marriages; however, in light of participant feedback on PREP, the program may have been able to cover these and other topics more effectively.

Whereas issues like communication and commitment overlap with core content in PREP and other programs (see Markman & Rhoades, 2012 ), a substantial portion of responses suggested that, although the skills taught in PREP may been helpful, they did not implement them in real-life situations, particularly during heated discussions. Research indicates that commitment and conflict management are related in that commitment helps partners inhibit negative behaviors and engage in more positive behaviors at critical moments ( Slotter et al., 2012 ); thus, the issues of commitment and conflict management are likely intertwined in important ways. Further, consistent with other research on a German version of PREP ( Hahlweg & Richter, 2010 ), participants also reported that they forgot some of the communication skills over time.

These findings highlight a key question for the couple research field regarding how to enhance couples’ ability to use beneficial strategies when they are most needed. One solution could be to increase the time couples spend in premarital education in order for them to master essential skills and to help them become more likely to constructively derail negative processes as they emerge. At the same time, the version of PREP that these couples received was 12 hours long, which is both on the long end of what most couples receive in premarital education ( Mdn = 8 hours; Stanley, Amato, Johnson, & Markman, 2006 ) and in the range of what tends to be the most effective dose ( Hawkins, Stanley, Blanchard, & Albright, 2012 ). Longer curricula do not seem to lead to stronger effects ( Hawkins, Stanley et al., 2012 ), but future random-assignment studies could address this question better.

With most premarital education services, including PREP, couples are not provided opportunities to practice new skills or receive coaching while they are upset or experiencing a difficult disagreement. A group or workshop format likely inhibits such real-world discussions. It could be that couples would benefit from new program content that helps them practice their skills better when they are having trouble. Couples may also benefit from additional opportunities to perfect the use of program strategies after the intervention has ended, such as through booster classes or individual meetings with coaches. Research indicates that such boosters may be effective ( Braukhaus, Hahlweg, Kroeger, Groth, & Fehm-Wolfsdorf, 2003 ). New technologies now offer innovative ways to deliver such boosters, such as through online training or smart phone applications.

Content Considerations for Premarital Education

Introducing new content on the issues that participants identified as final straws in their marriages may also be beneficial. These issues were infidelity, aggression or emotional abuse, and substance use. Addressing these behaviors directly in relationship education raises some questions regarding which couples relationship education providers might seek to help stay together as opposed to help break-up. We believe premarital education should serve as a prevention effort to help healthy and happy couples stay that way and that keeping distressed, abusive, or otherwise unhealthy couples together would not be a positive outcome. Research on the development of these “final straw” behaviors seems particularly important in the future. A limitation of the current study is that the pre-intervention assessment did not include the kinds of measures necessary to determine the extent to which couples in this study presented with these problems before marriage. Thus, future research is needed to investigate whether premarital education can help prevent couples from developing some of these “final straw” behaviors and whether it may help some couples with problems such as aggression or substance abuse either get the additional help they will need to change these behaviors or break up. We discuss preliminary ideas about whether/how premarital education might cover each of these final straw issues below.

Over half of all participants cited infidelity as a major reason for divorce and infidelity was the most often endorsed “final straw” reason. Infidelity is not a major focus in PREP, though the curriculum does address the importance of commitment, including protecting one’s relationship from attraction to others. Based on participants’ reports from this study, it may be that premarital programs could be improved by more directly addressing how to reduce the potential for extramarital involvement.

If providers or programs choose to address infidelity explicitly, Markman (2005) provides useful guidelines for covering the topic. These recommendations include informing participants that there are specific situations and developmental time periods within relationships with increased risks for engaging in extramarital relationships (e.g., transition to parenthood, close relationships with attractive alternatives, significant drinking). Furthermore, participants could be informed that the risk for extramarital relationships may increase during stressful times—such as when partners are separated for long periods by work demands or experiencing low marital satisfaction—and this information could be shared with participants. Partners could also be given structure to talk with each other about expectations for fidelity, management of relationships with friends or co-workers who could be attractive alternatives, and boundaries for their relationship. However, one barrier to increasing a focus on the prevention of infidelity in premarital education is that relationship commitment and satisfaction is highest right before marriage ( Rhoades, Stanley, & Markman, 2006 ), so engaged couples may not be receptive or eager to directly address the possibility of future extramarital affairs during this time ( Allen et al., 2005 ).

Substance abuse also appeared to be a prevalent problem at least for half of divorced couples in this sample. Overall, reports indicate that although substance abuse problems may have developed gradually throughout these relationships, this issue constituted the final straw to end the relationship for a number of individuals once the situation was perceived as insurmountable. Substance abuse is not currently addressed in PREP except that all couples attending PREP are provided with information on how to get more help for a range of problems, including substance abuse.

Premarital programs may benefit from educating participants on how substance abuse is not uncommon as a reason for divorce in an effort to encourage participants to address substance abuse problems as early as possible. Such program additions could also include how to recognize and get help for substance abuse and could encourage partners to discuss their expectations for substance use in the relationship. Partners may also benefit from discussing how to support each other in seeking help, should the need ever arise. Furthermore, couples could be taught that if a substance abuse develops in the relationship, there is often a discrepancy between partners regarding perspectives on the extent of the problem, which is evident by this study’s findings.

Domestic violence was cited by over a quarter of couples as a reason for divorce. When asked to elaborate, some described verbal abuse, while others described physical aggression. Often participants explained that they initially believed they could work through the problem, but later found it unbearable, as some participants considered an act of physical aggression as the final straw in their relationship. As others have suggested ( Halford, Markman, Kline, & Stanley, 2003 ), premarital education programs may benefit from teaching participants about recognizing, preventing, and getting help for aggression in relationships. In current models of PREP, all participants learn that aggression is unacceptable and they all receive basic information on ways to get help (e.g., through shelters), as to not put particular couples or individuals in awkward or unsafe circumstances in class. Still, more could be done.

The field continues to debate how to best address this issue, as different types of violence and couples of varying risk may warrant different approaches. M. P. Johnson (1995) distinguishes between situational couple violence and intimate terrorism. Specifically, situational couple violence tends to be much more common and represents aggression that comes out of conflict. It is typically initiated by either partner while intimate terrorism encompasses more controlling, threatening behavior, typically by the male partner.

With 36% of unmarried couples having experienced some form of physical aggression in the last year ( Rhoades, Stanley, Kelmer, & Markman, 2010 ), relationship education programs should take care not to scare couples who have experienced aggression away from seeking help. As is done routinely in PREP, it seems necessary in relationship education that providers and program content emphasize to all participants that any aggression is unacceptable and also suggest specific, local ways to seek help for problems with aggression. To develop further content, an understanding of the literature on aggression and violence, including men’s vs. women’s roles, and the different type of violence, is likely particularly important, as recommendations may be different for different kinds of problems. For example, recommendations for situational couple violence might include couple and/or individual therapy focused on intensive skills to help better manage negative affect and conflict effectively whereas intimate terrorism would most likely call for referrals to shelters or law enforcement. For further recommendations regarding domestic violence and relationship education, see suggestions by Derrington, Johnson, Menard, Ooms, and Stanley (2010) .

Financial hardship

Financial hardship was cited as a major reason for divorce that provided stress on their relationship by over half the sample. Although PREP helps couples learn communication skills to discuss stressful topics in general, it is worth considering whether specific content on money and economic stress is warranted. Participants could be asked to more directly share expectations about finances and learn coping skills for times of significant financial strain. They could also be provided with appropriate community resources to improve or stabilize their financial situations or these resources could be incorporated into relationship education efforts.

Marriage expectations

Almost half of interviewees commented that they did not know enough about the typical course of events in marriage. PREP typically addresses expectations by encouraging participants to recognize and discuss their own expectations for marriage ( Markman et al., 2010 ), but it does not provide explicit information about how marriages and families tend to develop over time. More content on normal marital development could be helpful. For example, information could be provided about how satisfaction typically drops and conflict tends to increase during the transition to parenthood (e.g., Doss, Rhoades, Stanley, & Markman, 2009b ) and about the course of attraction and sexual desire in relationships.

Previous research has shown that couples who develop serious difficulties, and eventually seek help, usually do so long after the problems have become deeply entrenched ( Doss, Rhoades, Stanley, & Markman, 2009a ). Thus, relationship education programs may benefit from providing guidelines regarding when to seek professional help and even have couples practice these difficult conversations to encourage them to seek help early and at times when changes are easiest to make. There is survey evidence that premarital education is associated with being more likely to use services later in the marriage ( Williamson, Karney, Trail, & Bradbury, 2012 ), but more direct content on how and when to seek help may be warranted.

This point about seeking help early is complicated by the fact that the majority of participants saw their partner as primarily responsible for participating in the “final straw” behaviors (infidelity, domestic violence, and substance use) and for not working hard enough to save the marriage. Most participants also believed that they, personally, should not have worked harder to save their marriages. Therefore, premarital education may need to focus on encouraging help seeking behaviors in couples with the understanding that most individuals may see their partners as primarily responsible for their difficulties, and therefore, may not feel personally responsible. In addition, the majority of couples displayed a pattern in which the women blamed their ex-husbands while their ex-husbands did not see themselves as responsible. Interestingly, as has been found elsewhere ( Amato & Previti, 2003 ; C. A. Johnson et al., 2001 ), women in this sample were also more likely to eventually file for divorce than men. Thus, it may be especially important that husbands and wives develop realistic expectations about seeking help together, so that they later do not disagree about what circumstances might constitute a need for help.

The Timing of Premarital Education

Our findings show that a considerable number of participants wished that they had known more about their partner before marriage, saying they would have either learned how to handle differences better or left the relationship. Many others believed they had married too young. Also, a portion of participants mentioned that they participated in PREP during a time when the constraints of wedding plans made it more likely for them to ignore factors that may have otherwise ended their relationship. These participant comments highlight the difference between when couples might ideally benefit from premarital education compared to when couples typically seek it. One of the potential benefits of relationship education is that is can help some couples on an ill-advised or premature path toward marriage to reconsider their plans (see Stanley, 2001 ); however, couples typically participate in these programs close to their wedding dates, a time when ending the relationship may be especially difficult.

A potentially stronger overall prevention strategy is to reach people earlier in their relationships, before constraints to marry are in place, or even before individuals enter relationships ( Rhoades & Stanley, 2009 ). Early, individual-oriented relationship education can help individuals develop and practice healthy relationship skills and also help them end unsafe or unhealthy relationships ( Rhoades & Stanley, 2011 ). One recently-developed relationship education curriculum designed for individuals, Within My Reach ( Pearson, Stanley, & Rhoades, 2008 ), has shown success in teaching these skills and helping individuals reach their personal relationship goals ( Antle, Karam, Christensen, Barbee, & Sar, 2011 ). Thus, future research may wish to consider how to encourage individuals and/or couples who have yet to make commitments to marry to participate in relationship education programs, as well as how and when these programs should advise individuals to leave damaging relationships.

Conclusions and Limitations

This study provides new information regarding the reasons for divorce and possible improvements to relationship education programs based on feedback from divorced individuals who participated in PREP premaritally. Although the study focuses on improving the PREP model specifically, relationship education programs working with premarital populations may also find value in our findings, particularly regarding how to cover specific topics deemed important by our participants. Other programs may also benefit from suggestions to provide relationship education earlier and to provide services to help couples master their skill development over time.

This study also has several limitations that warrant discussion. First, respondent reports of their progression toward divorce and premarital education experiences were retrospective and may therefore be biased by the passing of time. Future studies may wish to evaluate relationship problems and reasons for divorce closer to the couple’s decision to divorce. Second, the sample was mostly White and only included participants in heterosexual relationships who married within mostly Christian-based religious organizations. Therefore, future studies are needed to examine whether these findings would be replicated with other groups or cultures. A third limitation is the lack of a comparison group of couples who participated in PREP but did not divorce. As a result, it is not clear whether or not the problems and recommendations these participants identified are specific to this divorced sample, or would translate to couples who remain married. Finally, all participants in this study received PREP when they were engaged to be married so research is needed to evaluate reasons for relationship dissolution and how to improve programs that target individuals and couples in different relationship stages (e.g. dating or married). Nevertheless, this study provides new insight in potential improvements to the content and timing of relationship education.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by award number R01HD053314 from the Eunice Kennedy Shrivner National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the Eunice Kennedy Shrivner National Institute of Child Health and Human Development or National Institutes of Health.

Contributor Information

Shelby B. Scott, Department of Psychology, University of Denver.

Galena K. Rhoades, Department of Psychology, University of Denver.

Scott M. Stanley, Department of Psychology, University of Denver.

Elizabeth S. Allen, Department of Psychology, University of Colorado – Denver.

Howard J. Markman, Department of Psychology, University of Denver.

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