Surprisingly Like Mainstream Europe: Mapping Attitudes toward Marriage in Albania

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Abstract

Attitudes toward marriage or its alternatives powerfully impact the lives of adults and children. Although typologies of attitudes toward marriage have been developed and empirically tested in the West, studies using nationally representative data are lacking in Albania. This study used agglomerative hierarchical regression analyses and discriminant analyses to test the hypothesis that institutional, companionate and individualistic attitudes toward marriage described in literature from Europe and North America would emerge in the data from Albania, alongside a hypothesized fourth ‘façade’ attitudinal grouping. Findings supported the hypothesized presence of institutional, companionate and individualistic attitudes toward marriage in Albania, but did not clearly support the presence of a hypothesized ‘facade’ view of marriage. The study found that despite its long isolation from Western Europe and the prevalence of medieval codes of conduct well into the last century, that attitudes in Albania are surprisingly similar to those reported in literature for other European countries.

Author

• Timothy P Hagen, Epoka University