CDC report
The number of couples who live together before marriage continues to rise, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.(Jennifer S. Altman / For The Times)


Americans are increasingly saying “I do” to living together before marriage, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In fact, cohabitation is now more common among younger women than living with a spouse or living alone.
The report, released Thursday, is based on data from the CDC’s National Survey of Family Growth. More than 12,000 women between the ages of 15 and 44 took part in the survey between 2006 and 2010. (So did more than 10,000 men, but the new study focuses on the women.)
Among the women, 48% told interviewers that they were living with their significant other but were not married to them. In 1995, only 35% of women were cohabiting with their partners, according to a previous edition of the survey.
On the flip side, fewer couples are now waiting until they’re married to move in together. Only 23% of the women who answered the survey between 2006 and 2010 said they got married first, down from 39% in 1995. (The proportion of women who were not living with a boyfriend or husband has held steady in the 27%-to-29% range during this time.)
Couples aren’t only cohabiting more often than in the past, they’re doing it much longer, the study found. The women in the most recent survey averaged 22 months for their first stint at living together (after which they either got married or broke up). Back in 1995, the average length of cohabitation was 13 months, the researchers reported.
For 40% of the women surveyed between 2006 and 2010, these live-in relationships led to marriages, according to the study. That conversion rate was higher for white women (44%), for Latinas who came to the U.S. from other countries (42%), and for women with a college degree (53%). But not everyone made it to the altar within three years of moving in together -- 32% of couples were still cohabiting, and 27% of couples split up.
The cohabitation trend was pretty widespread, but some women were more likely to give it a try than others. Women who dropped out of high school were most likely to move in with a boyfriend -- 70% said they had done so, the study found. So did 65% of Latinas born in the U.S. and 57% of white women.
In fact, living together has become more common since 1995 for all ethnic and racial groups except Asians, the researchers reported.
The older women got, the more likely they were to have tried it. A majority (55%) of women said they had lived with a boyfriend by age 25; by the time those women turned 30, a full 74% had cohabited.
Women living with their significant others are also more likely to get pregnant now than in years past, the researchers found. Back in 1995, only 15% of unmarried, cohabiting couples got pregnant; between 2006 and 2010, that figure was 19%.
Among women who moved in with a significant other before they turned 20, 25% became pregnant before they got married. But among women over 30, 8% got pregnant before marriage, the study found. The pregnancy rate for women who didn’t finish high school was 33%, compared with 5% of women who finished college.
Overall, getting pregnant was less likely to lead to marriage than in years past. Between 2006 and 2010, 19% of pregnancies prompted couples to get married. In 1995, 32% of pregnancies led to marriages, the researchers reported.
The results dovetail with a report last month that found Americans were waiting longer than ever to get married for the first time. Researchers from the University fo Virginia’s National Marriage Project and others reported that the average age of first-time brides was 26.5 years and for bridegrooms was 28.7 -- both historic highs.
source : Los Angels Times




Male baldness 'indicates heart risk'

Man with thinning hairHeart experts say men who have lost their hair 'should not be alarmed'

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Men going thin on top may be more likely to have heart problems than their friends with a full head of hair, according to researchers in Japan.
Their study of nearly 37,000 people, published in the online journal BMJ Open, said balding men were 32% more likely to have coronary heart disease.
However, the researchers said the risks were less than for smoking or obesity.
The British Heart Foundation said men should focus on their waistline, not their hairline.
A shifting hairline is a fact of life for many men. Half have thinning hair by their 50s and 80% have some hair loss by the age of 70.
Researchers at the University of Tokyo sifted through years of previous research into links between hair loss and heart problems.

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It's more important to pay attention to your waistline than your hairline”
Doireann MaddockBritish Heart Foundation
They showed that hair that went thin on the crown was associated with coronary heart disease. This was after adjusting for other risk factors such as age and family history.
However, a receding hairline did not seem to affect the risk.
Focus on lifestyle
Dr Tomohide Yamada, of the University of Tokyo, told the BBC: "We found a significant, though modest, link between baldness, at least on the top of the head, and risk for coronary heart disease.
"We thought this is a link, but not as strong as many other known links such as smoking, obesity, cholesterol levels and blood pressure."
He said younger men losing hair on the top of their head should focus on improving their lifestyle to ensure they keep their heart healthy.
However, he said there was not enough evidence to suggest screening bald men for heart problems.

Deadly disease

Coronary heart disease is the biggest killer in the UK.
One in five men and one in eight women dies of the disease.
It is caused by blood vessels that nourish the heart becoming blocked.
Any explanation for the link is uncertain.
There are ideas about increased sensitivity to male hormones, insulin resistance and inflammation in blood vessels affecting both the heart and the hair.
Doireann Maddock, a cardiac nurse with the British Heart Foundation, said: "Although these findings are interesting, men who've lost their hair should not be alarmed by this analysis.
"Much more research is needed to confirm any link between male pattern baldness and an increased risk of coronary heart disease. In the meantime, it's more important to pay attention to your waistline than your hairline.
"Hereditary hair loss may be out of your control, but many of the risk factors for coronary heart disease are not. Stopping smoking, maintaining a healthy weight and being as active as possible are all things that you can do to help protect your heart."
Patrick Wolfe, a professor of statistics at University College London, said: "Right now the link that is seemingly responsible for this relative risk increase is not well understood, and so in future we might look forward to a day when understanding more about the various mechanisms underlying heart disease will tell us more about those underlying male pattern baldness, and vice versa.
"In the meantime it's a case of focusing on the things that we can control - our diet, exercise regimens and other risk factors - to lower our overall risk for heart disease."