IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/qss/dqsswp/2016.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Internet Access and Partnership Formation in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • Maria Sironi

    (Social Research Institute, University College London)

  • Ridhi Kashyap

    (Department of Sociology and Nuffield College, University of Oxford)

Abstract

The Internet has fundamentally altered how we communicate, access information and who we can interact with. These features are all potentially salient for mate search – but the implications of Internet access for partnership formation are theoretically ambiguous. We examine the association between Internet access and heterosexual and homosexual partnership formation using nationally-representative data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) and the Current Population Survey (CPS) from the US. Across both data sources, we find that the association between Internet access and partnership formation (in the NLSY) and partnership status (in the CPS) is age-dependent. While negative at younger ages, the association becomes positive as individuals grow older and reach their mid- to late-20s for both homosexual and heterosexual partnerships. We interpret these results to suggest that the Internet facilitates union formation when individuals approach the stage in their life course when they feel ready to commit to a long-term partnership.

Suggested Citation

  • Maria Sironi & Ridhi Kashyap, 2020. "Internet Access and Partnership Formation in the United States," DoQSS Working Papers 20-16, Quantitative Social Science - UCL Social Research Institute, University College London.
    • Handle: RePEc:qss:dqsswp:2016
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.ioe.ac.uk/REPEc/pdf/qsswp2016.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andriana Bellou, 2015. "The impact of Internet diffusion on marriage rates: evidence from the broadband market," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 28(2), pages 265-297, April.
    2. Robert Schoen & Nancy Landale & Kimberly Daniels, 2007. "Family transitions in Young Adulthood," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 44(4), pages 807-820, November.
    3. repec:pri:cpanda:wp17%20-%20dimaggio,%20hargittai,%20neuman,%20robinson is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Francesco C. Billari & Osea Giuntella & Luca Stella, 2019. "Does broadband Internet affect fertility?," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 73(3), pages 297-316, September.
    5. Paul DiMaggio & Eszter Hargittai & W. Russell Neuman & John P. Robinson, 2001. "Social Implications of the Internet," Working Papers 159, Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Center for Arts and Cultural Policy Studies..
    6. Michael J. Rosenfeld & Reuben J. Thomas & Sonia Hausen, 2019. "Disintermediating your friends: How online dating in the United States displaces other ways of meeting," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 116(36), pages 17753-17758, September.
    7. Paul DiMaggio & Eszter Hargittai & W. Russell Neuman & John P. Robinson, 2001. "Social Implications of the Internet," Working Papers 159, Princeton University, School of Public and International Affairs, Center for Arts and Cultural Policy Studies..
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David E. Bloom & Michael Kuhn & Klaus Prettner, 2024. "Fertility in High-Income Countries: Trends, Patterns, Determinants, and Consequences," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 16(1), pages 159-184, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Geraci, Andrea & Nardotto, Mattia & Reggiani, Tommaso & Sabatini, Fabio, 2022. "Broadband Internet and social capital," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    2. Francesco C. Billari & Osea Giuntella & Luca Stella, 2019. "Does broadband Internet affect fertility?," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 73(3), pages 297-316, September.
    3. Yanina Welp & Ferran Urgell & Eduard Aibar, 2007. "From Bureaucratic Administration to Network Administration? An Empirical Study on E-Government Focus on Catalonia," Public Organization Review, Springer, vol. 7(4), pages 299-316, December.
    4. Luca Maria Pesando & Valentina Rotondi & Manuela Stranges & Ridhi Kashyap & Francesco C. Billari, 2021. "The Internetization of International Migration," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 47(1), pages 79-111, March.
    5. Stan Geertman & John Stillwell, 2020. "Planning support science: Developments and challenges," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 47(8), pages 1326-1342, October.
    6. Ugo Bolletta & Luca Paolo Merlino, 2022. "Marriage Through Friends," Dynamic Games and Applications, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 1046-1066, December.
    7. Sefa Awaworyi Churchill & Davidson Okai & Alberto Posso, 2016. "Internet Use and Ethnic Heterogeneity in a Cross-Section of Countries," Economic Papers, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 35(1), pages 59-72, March.
    8. Angelo Antoci & Alexia Delfino & Fabio Paglieri & Fabrizio Panebianco & Fabio Sabatini, 2016. "Civility vs. Incivility in Online Social Interactions: An Evolutionary Approach," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(11), pages 1-17, November.
    9. Carlota Batres & David I Perrett, 2014. "The Influence of the Digital Divide on Face Preferences in El Salvador: People without Internet Access Prefer More Feminine Men, More Masculine Women, and Women with Higher Adiposity," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(7), pages 1-6, July.
    10. Özbay, Özden, 2008. "Does social capital deter youth from cheating, alcohol use, and violence in Turkey?: Bringing torpil in," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 36(5), pages 403-415, September.
    11. Dohse, Dirk & Lim, Cheng Yee, 2016. "Macro-geographic location and internet adoption in poor countries: What is behind the persistent digital gap?," Kiel Working Papers 2067, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    12. Judit Bar-Ilan, 2018. "Eugene Garfield on the Web in 2001," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 114(2), pages 389-399, February.
    13. Dejean, Sylvain & Jullien, Nicolas, 2015. "Big from the beginning: Assessing online contributors’ behavior by their first contribution," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(6), pages 1226-1239.
    14. Judy Wajcman & Emily Rose & Judith E. Brown & Michael Bittman, 2010. "Enacting virtual connections between work and home," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 29439, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    15. Uwe Matzat, 2004. "The Social Embeddedness of Academic Online Groups in Offline Networks as a Norm Generating Structure: An Empirical Test of the Coleman Model on Norm Emergence," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 10(3), pages 205-226, November.
    16. Nevado-Peña, Domingo & López-Ruiz, Víctor-Raúl & Alfaro-Navarro, José-Luis, 2019. "Improving quality of life perception with ICT use and technological capacity in Europe," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    17. Zhang, Shiying & Wang, Qing & Xiao, Yao & Zhang, Yilin, 2023. "Internet exposure during adolescence and age at first marriage," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    18. Ali, Maged & Gomes, Lucas Moreira & Azab, Nahed & de Moraes Souza, João Gabriel & Sorour, M. Karim & Kimura, Herbert, 2023. "Panic buying and fake news in urban vs. rural England: A case study of twitter during COVID-19," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    19. Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, Banji & Lal, Kaushalesh, 2005. "Internet diffusion in sub-Saharan Africa: A cross-country analysis," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 29(7), pages 507-527, August.
    20. Angelo Antoci & Fabio Sabatini, 2018. "Online networks, social interaction and segregation: an evolutionary approach," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 28(4), pages 859-883, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Internet Access; Technology; Union Formation; Life Course; NLSY97; CPS.JEL;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
    • O51 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - U.S.; Canada
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:qss:dqsswp:2016. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Dr Neus Bover Fonts (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dqioeuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.