Research Handbook on Partnering across the Life Course

This Research Handbook provides a comprehensive overview of the changing landscape of human partnerships, integrating diverse theoretical and empirical perspectives. Leading scholars explore the complex interplay between individual life trajectories, societal norms, and legal frameworks in shaping modern relationships.

The Research Handbook on Partnering across the Life Course is an interdisciplinary collaboration by researchers in demography, sociology, psychology, and law. Chapters discuss marriage, cohabitation, and relationships, covering LGBTQ+, long-distance, arranged, polyamorous, and living apart together (LAT) partnerships. They address partnerships across the life course, from formation, including online dating and hook-up culture, to break-ups, re-partnering, and partnerships in later life. The contributing authors analyse the dynamics within a partnership, focusing on key aspects like sex, money, and children, as well as related factors such as family, health, gender, and migration, along with their impacts. Ultimately, the Research Handbook examines diversity in partnerships across the globe and explores the roles of the economy and the welfare state.

Presenting innovative insights on relationship dynamics, this Research Handbook is a crucial resource for students and scholars across the social sciences working on family and gender studies.

Edited by Dimitri Mortelmans, Centre for Population, Family and Health (CPFH), University of Antwerp, Belgium, Laura Bernardi, Swiss Center of Expertise in Life Course Research (LIVES), University of Lausanne, Switzerland, and Brienna Perelli-Harris, Department of Social Statistics and Demography, University of Southampton, UK