Marriage A La Mode

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30044, 31 January 1963, Page 2

Marriage A La Mode

(Special Correapondaid N.Z.P.A.)

LONDON, January 30. Forty couple* aH students at London Uttiveraity. told the compilers of a report on attitudes to marriage to the university that they were living together as man and wife. Tbe main reason they gave was “it is cheaper that claimed that two stogie grants were worth more than the equivalent for a married couple and said they regarded their relationship as a perfectly adequate substitute for marriage. The report was made after inquiries by a team directed by a former psychology student, Mn Susan Masterman, aged 22, the wife of a former engineering student and mother of an 13-mooth-old boy. Tbe report appears in toe latest issue of the university magazine. Two hundred couplee, most of them just over 20, answered the questions. Tbe report showed sexual ratottonehlps were prevetem among moot students. A third of the engaged couples bad sexual relationships and

almost all married couples had sexual relationships before they married. Commenting on the foot that so many couples preferred living together to marriage, one student said: "We think it ta a valuable experience and it is more realistic and rewarding than living separately. There ta nothing wrong in living together unices one ta doing it for the wrong reason—we could wish for a more enlightened attitude."

Another student said that trial marriage was the only reasonable solution for students at the university. Long engagements caused physical and meatal frustration and a trial marriage stopped repression and did a greet deal of good. Mrs Masterman said: "The results s'-ow that marriage or a suitable form of relationship definitely helps a student to settle down. As tar as finance to concerned, rattier than take the risk of losing anything, a lot of couples ' would rather live together than get married.**