Family, Life Course, and Society Commons^™

When To Marry, If At All?A Qualitative Exploration Of How Sexual Minority Young Adults In The Us Think About Marital Timing, Aaron Hoy, Sachita Pokhrel

The Qualitative Report

According to prior research, the average age at first marriage has steadily increased in the US due in large part to the significance that young adults place on marriage and their evolving conceptions of marital readiness. However, despite the nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015, there is a significant oversight of sexual minorities in this research. To address this, we draw upon qualitative data collected through an online survey to explore how our sample of unmarried sexual minority young adults (N=256) think about marital timing. The results of our thematic analysis show that those in our sample …