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“Ethnic Variations in Characteristics of First Unions” 179
Racial and ethnic variations in marriage and cohabitation
patterns have been a core concern of U.S. family research.
Numerous studies have documented the different values and
union characteristics observed between minority groups and
Americans of European ancestry (Casper & Bianchi, 2002;
Crissey, 2005; Manning & Landale, 1996; Manning & Smock,
1995; Schoen & Cheng, 2006; Schoen, Landale, & Daniels,
2007; Staples & Mirande, 1980). Despite the extensive
literature on racial differences in union formation and heated
discussions about
dramatic
family changes in recent decades,
relatively little research has focused on Asian Americans
—
the
fastest growing minority group in the U.S. (Lee & Zhou, 2004;
McLoyd, Cauce, Takeuchi, & Wilson, 2000). The fact that the
Asian American population is projected to grow from 1% of the
total U.S. population in 1970 to 10% in 2050 (Hoeffel, Rastogi,
Kim, & Shahid, 2012; Martin & Midgley, 2003) underscores the
necessity of devoting more attention to investigating important
issues such as the ethnic variations in marriage timing and the
prevalence of premarital cohabitation among Asian Americans.
One key explanation for this lacuna in empirical studies is a
lack of data (i.e., sufficiently large sample size) for Asian Americans
in major national family and social surveys. Such data limitations
have led to the use of the pan-ethnic group “Asian American” as a
common practice in most studies. Yet, the fact that Asian Americans
come from more than twenty different countries and have varying
socioeconomic backgrounds and modes of entry into the U.S.
makes them a very diverse group (Zhou, 2007). Scholars have long
suggested that broad ethnic variations in outcomes exist within the
larger pan-ethnic category of “Asian Americans.” However, data
limitations make it difficult to explore subgroup variations in
family patterns because of insufficient event occurrences. In turn,
very few studies have attempted to describe and explain ethnic
diversity in union formation patterns between Asian American
subgroups.