Intercouple dating on a college campus

Four-hundred-eighty-six university students completed a confidential questionnaire designed to assess a multitude of aspects of their current and past dating relationships. The 24-item questionnaire was designed to highlight the prevalence and rate that individuals were involved in InterCouple relationships; these being interfaith, intercultural, and/or interracial romantic relationships. 66% of the participants reported being involved at some time in an InterCouple relationship. The overall results of the survey and the importance to college personnel and students are given.

The issue of interracial (and other types of cross-cultural) dating has been an increasing topic on college campuses. Rates of inter-dating are increasing, leading some institutions to examine their policies and services for their students. Recently, Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist Christian University just dropped its controversial ban of interracial dating of its students. Russo (2001) reported that interracial couples occur most frequently in university towns, cities, and large states with diverse populations.

This paper will explore the issue of interracial, interfaith, and intercultural dating on college campuses. Further the results of a university-wide questionnaire exploring the dating practices of undergraduate students will be given.

College Student Dating

Meeting potential dates and mates occurs quite readily on college campuses (DeGenova & Rice, 2002). There has been a change on college campuses from that of segregation of the sexes to one of increased contacts in classrooms, residences, and social centers. Dating is also done more informally today than it once was. However, the college romance frequently leads to engagement and marriage. Moore (1999) suggests that “college dating should be taken seriously as potentially leading to marriage” (p. 120).

In a study done at East Carolina University, ¼ of the students surveyed reported having dated interracially (Knox, Zusman, Buffington, & Hemphill, 2000). Of the students answering the questionnaire, almost half of them expressed an openness to become involved in an inter-racial relationship. These authors suggest that one of the reasons for the increase in interracial dating is that there has been a greater minority enrollment in colleges and universities. This then engages people from different races into more frequent contact with each other leading to more approving behaviors among college students regarding the topic of interracial relationships.

Prevalence of InterCouple Relationships

For the purposes of this study, InterCouple relationships will be defined as those that have any or all of the following types of relationships: interfaith; intercultural; interracial.

Black-White interracial marriage has not been readily accepted by mainstream American society. Until recently, many states prohibited through legal means this type of relationship. On June 12, 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court, in the Loving v. Virginia decision, ruled that laws which prohibited interracial marriage were unconstitutional. At that time, there were 16 states which had these miscegenation laws (Davidson, 1992; Foeman & Nance, 1999).

The Black-White couple is usually the most visually identifiable, yet there are other types of interracial relationships (i.e., Hispanic-Asian; Asian-Caucasian; etc.). Before 1980 the U.S. Census Bureau did not distinguish between interracial relationships other than Black-White (Mok, 1999). In the last thirty years there has been an increasing trend toward interracial relationships. Orbe (1999) reported that 60% of Japanese who marry in the United States married someone from a different racial background. Asians and Hispanics tend to marry different races more than African Americans. As of 1998, there was more than 1 million Hispanic-non-Hispanic marriages in the U.S. (Crohn, 1998).

In 1988, approximately 218,00 Black-White couples had married each other (Davidson, 1992). In 1990, Japanese-Americans intermarried at 40.6% and Native Americans at 53.7% (Foeman & Nance, 1999). Winn and Priest (1993) stated that the statistics from the 1990 Census suggested that at least 900,000 interracial married couples existed in the U.S.

Couples of different faiths are also getting married in exceeding proportions. In 1995, approximately thirty-three million Americans lived in an interfaith household (Crohn, 1995). For various religious groups, these proportions are different. Crohn (1995) reported that before 1960, Jews intermarried at a rate less than 10%. As of 1995, Jews intermarried at a rate of over 52%.

This push for multiculturalism in couple relationships is occurring with people at various age ranges. Many younger individuals, especially adolescents, are beginning to engage in cross-cultural relationships. There is an increased prevalence of teenagers in America interracially dating (Peterson, 2000). In this USA Today survey, 57% of teenagers had dated someone outside their race, 30% had indicated that they would consider dating outside of their race, 43% of teens had not dated interracially, and 13% said they never would. This was quite a rise from a previous Gallup poll in 1980 where only 17% of teens said they had dated interracially (although Hispanics were not included in this original survey).

In a study done by Joyner and reported by Wilensky (2002), nearly 1/5 of all the adolescents surveyed had been in an interracial romantic relationship. With immigration and rising birth rates for minorities, many adolescents who would not get the opportunity to interact with people from other races and ethnicities are coming into contact with them at school, work, and other locations.

Relationship Formation

Young adulthood is a time where individuals try to find out who they are, what they want to do in life, and begin to find a partner to do these things with. One of the first developmental theorists, Erik Erikson, discussed this period as intimacy versus isolation (Burger, 2000). During this timeframe, beginning just as the teen years are ending, the development of intimate relationships is key. One of the tasks of young adults is to seek out and find someone who they can feel close to and learn how to be intimate and emotional in an adult-to-adult relationship. By being intimate, both individuals are allowed to grow, emotionally and psychologically. As Burger (2000) states, “Although the development of intimacy within these special relationships typically results in marriage or a romantic commitment to one person, this need not always be the case” (p. 120). If a young adult does not find relationships in which to be intimate with someone else, they will then potentially develop feelings of isolation. The isolated person is characterized by having many superficial relationships and may avoid emotional commitment.

There are many theories of why individuals choose a partner. These theories allow us to understand the process of mate selection and view it in a maturational perspective. One such theory is the filter theory. In this process, mates are cognitively put through a series of steps (filters) which at any time can stop the process. Murstein (1986) suggested that perhaps the first filter is the amount of match on external characteristics (i.e., appearance, manners). If the person was not filtered out, the next step is to check on how closely the two people’s beliefs and attitudes are (i.e., religion, sex). The last filter suggested is that of role fit; how much does the other person fit with your needs. Filter theories have some substantiation, yet, it is thought that all the filters occur simultaneously, instead of in steps. These filters are also socially created as to how much fit or match people have to us. With the increased globalization through travel, media, and the internet, people are coming into contact with a wider array of cultures, races, and faiths.

A second theory of why and how people form intimate relationships is that of exchange theory. In this process each person brings unique attributes to the relationship. We then try to find someone where we have the best exchange of assets. It is thought that, in general, women exchange attractiveness for perceived stability in men. Gaines, Rios, Granrose, and Bledsoe (1999) found that in interracial relationships, the individuals in these relationships exchanged affections and respect at significant levels. Pope (1986) discussed the exchange theory in interracial relationships and concluded that the exchange hypothesis that Black men exchange their higher economic or professional status to White women for their higher caste status was unsubstantiated. This idea that Blacks marry Whites for status, hypergamy, has also been refuted by Foeman and Nance (1999) who stated that, “These factors indicate that other variables are more important than simple social-economic exchange, and that greater equity rather than disparity increases the likelihood of interracial coupling” (p. 543).

The issue of couples from different backgrounds coming together is gaining newfound popularity in the literature. The current study is an attempt to attain the prevalence of InterCouple relationships on an urban college campus. Various aspects of these relationships are explored and some general conclusions are made.

Method
A questionnaire was developed to assess the frequency, types, satisfaction, and other various components of dating, particularly InterCouple dating. This 24-item questionnaire involved several different types of questions including demographics, Likert-type items; and preference questions. The questionnaire was given to 486 undergraduate students at Nova Southeastern University. This University is located in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and is a very multicultural university. It is also quite untraditional, as it has day students (traditional college students) and career students (older adults).

Participant Demographics

Out of the 486 students who filled out the questionnaire, 118 were males (24%) and 368 were females (76%). The mean age was 22.33 with a standard deviation of 7.36. The range was 17-62 while the mode was 19. Their year in school was 150 freshmen (31%), 125 sophomores (26%), 124 juniors (26%), and 87 seniors (18%).

45.9% of the participants were Caucasian, 20% were Hispanic; 18.1% were African-American, while the other 14% were of various ethnic backgrounds (predominantly Asian and Indian). In terms of religion, 31.9% of the participants were Catholic, 22% Christian, 8% Jewish, and a variety of other religions filled out the remaining 38%.

Results
171 of the participants (35.2%) were not currently in a relationship; 32.3% were in an intracouple relationship; 19.8% in an intercultural relationship; 12.1% in an interfaith relationship and 12.1% in an interracial relationship. There was some overlap of people being in more than one type of relationship. The mean length of months in a relationship was 24.9. For those students 25 and under, their mean length of relationship was 20.3. The number of past and current romantic relationships per person was an average of 3.1. The participants averaged 1.32 InterCouple relationships per person.

As to which types of InterCouple relationships they engaged in, the breakdown was as follows: 41 interracial; 68 interfaith;88 intercultural; 12 interracial /interfaith; 80 interracial/interfaith/intercultural; 32 interracial/intercultural; and 54 interfaith/intercultural. Of the sample, 191 individuals (39.3) reported that their parents had or are in an InterCouple relationship. There was a mean of 2.06 of their friends who were in InterCouple relationships.

The participants were also asked how they though their parents would feel if they were involved in an InterCouple relationship. They were given a 5-choice scale including Very upset, somewhat upset, neutral, somewhat happy, and very happy. Their scores averaged between somewhat upset and neutral. They were also asked the likelihood that they would marry into any of these three types of relationships. They averaged between somewhat likely and don’t know. This shows a move toward individuality that overall they think their family would be somewhat upset yet still believe that they would be somewhat likely to marry into a different culture, race, or faith.

Discussion
Over half of the sample reported that they are in or had been in some form of an InterCouple relationship. This seems to be the trend for many of today’s institutes of higher learning. Nova Southeastern University is a very diverse campus. Other universities are moving to multiculturalism and are finding that students on their campus are engaging in cross-cultural relationships.

Many universities have student centers which help aid the life of students on the campus. These centers can utilize this information to help develop workshops and trainings for faculty, staff, and students. The more that individuals are educated about this growing type of couple, the more prepared all will be in dealing with some of the unique issues that these couples deal with.

Different universities will have different percentages of their students engaging in InterCouple relationships, depending on location, religiosity, and other factors. However, these results seem to fit the trend toward more diverse and unique relationships occurring in the college-aged student.