How Culture And Religion Affects Divorce: A Case Study Of Belgium (Essay Sample)

How Culture and Religion Affects Divorce: A case study of Belgium
Abstract
Divorce is often considered by a couple when there is a continuing conflict that results in a significant relationship loss. The continued conflict has long term effects on individual’s identity towards another. Culture and religion largely contributes to divorce especially in a country like Belgium which has two regions with different languages. Even though the country is unitary with similar institutional structures, it also has a single family policy. The country is however divided culturally with Northern part being Catholic and southern part being secular, the Wallonia. This study will look across both the northern and southern cultures and religion and how it contributes to the divorce in Belgium. The study concluded that the differences in divorce likelihood across the two Belgian regions are not caused by the different composition of the inhabitants, but can be attributed to different regional cultural characteristics.
Keywords: Divorce, Culture, Religion, Belgium.
Introduction
Cultural and religious believes influences social interaction. Language, a demographic element goes hand in hand with culture. Belgium consists of French speaking and Dutch speaking people. Cross national differences in culture and region is a major determinant when considering family dissolution.
Literature Review
Research done before on divorce focused on individual (Jalovaara, 2002; Kalmijn, de Graaf, & Poortman, 2004) and on couple-level (Raeymaeckers, Snoeckx, & Mortelmans, 2006). According to Inglehart & Norris, 2003, cultural and religious tendencies have a long term influence on people life course decisions. In explaining the national differences in value patterns across Europe, Gundelach (1994) agrees with them by emphasizing that values are influenced by the specific institutional characteristics that exist in different nations.
Behavioral tendencies based on religion and culture can be looked on as a single country. Behavioral outcomes are different across the cultures. The decline rates of marriages are coinciding with increase rates of divorce with a fall in marital fertility rates. (Lesthaeghe & Neels, 2002; Zwaan, 1993).
Belgian divorce rates are among the highest in Western Europe, almost drawing level with the northern forerunners like Denmark (Eurostat, 2000). Jacobs (2000) comes to the same finding: Belgium’s high divorce rates can primarily be attributed to the divorce figures of Brussels and Wallonia. Earlier research (Snoeckxet al., 2006) already indicated that the mere fact of being Flemish, compared to being an inhabitant of Brussels or Wallonia, significantly reducesthe risk of divorce, and this remains the case when sociodemographic,relational, and fertility characteristics are taken into accountThe dichotomy between the northern and southern parts of Belgium also reveals itself in the differences with regard to the relational value system. The Flemish adhere more to a relational homogenous orientation with regard to religious and political opinions and social background.
Research Questions
1 Does culture affect the rates of divorce in Belgium?
2 Does religion affect the rates of divorce in Belgium?
Method
Study Design
This study represents secondary analyses of data collected from two categories; Flanders; Brussels and Wallonia. The data for the analysis come from the Panel Study of Belgian Households(PSBH). This panel study followed both individuals and households from 1992 until 2001. Divorce was used as a dependent variable (Y) while two factors of the respondents namely culture and religion were used as independent variables (X). The implicit model of the regression was as indicated in the equation 1 below:
Y = β1X1+ β2X2 + e……………..Equation 1
Where;
Y = Divorce
X1 = Culture
X2 = Religion
e = Error Term; where the error terms are assumed to be independent and normally distributed with mean zero and constant variance.
The null hypothesis was that each independent was having absolutely no effect and the study was looking for a reason to reject this theory. The t-ratio was used to test the joint hypothesis to show whether the included variables exerted any significant influence on the dependent variable. It tested the null hypothesis that all the estimated coefficients are zero. The hypotheses are explicitly represented as follows:
Ho: β1 to β2 = 0…………………………Equation 2
HA: β1 to β2 ≠ 0…………………………Equation 3. The study sample selected covered both married and divorced individuals (n=3911).
Participants and Data Measures
The questionnaire in this study was self-administered by the respondents. Self-administration increases the odds for a greater number of respondents since there will be no error of wrong postage. It is considered cheaper than interviewing and it also reduces interviewer biasness and social desirability (Trochim and William, 2006).
Results
Theoretical framework explains the importance of culture and religion by explaining the differences in divorce rates on studies undertaken. In the questionannaire, we introduced the micro and macro determinants and how they interact with culture and religion in Belgium to signficantly affect the divorce.
The views of respondents on how culture and religion’s macro and micro determinants contribute to the divorce in Belgium is illustrated in the table 1.0 below.
Table 1.0
Statement

Strongly agree

Agree

Neutral

Disagree

Strongly disagree

Total

Does education level of an individual affects stability of marriage

4
25%

8
50%

2
12.5%

1
6.25%

1
6.25%

16
100%

Is Premarital cohabitation contributes to stability of marriage

1
6.25%

4
25%

1
6.25%

6
37.5%

4
25%

16
100%

Does belonging to a certain religion affects the stability of marriage

4
25%

8
50%

0
0%

2
12.5%

0
0%

16
100%

Does attending a religious service contributes to marriage stability?

2
12.5%

8
50%

4
25%

1
6.25%

1
6.25%

16
100%

Is high income affecting stability of marriage

10
62.5%

4
25%

2
12.5%

0
0%

0
0%

16
100%

Is marrying at old age contributes to divorce

10
62.5%

4
25%

2
12.5%

0
0%

0
0%

16
100%

Does having more than 3 children contributes to divorce

4
25%

10
62.5%

2
12.5%

0
0%

0
0%

16
100%

Source: Author’s Calculations, 2016
Majority of respondents (62.5%) strongly agree that having high income contributes to consideration of divorce among the couples. However a paltry (6.25%) of the respondents strongly agree premarital cohabitation plays a major role in stability of marriage.
Analysis.
Analysis of Variance (ANOVA)
ANOVA is a technique used to investigate any number of factors which are hypothesized or said to influence the dependent variable. In this study, ANOVA is used to determine the influence of independent variables culture and religion on the dependent variable which in this case is divorce.
Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) Results
Table 2.0
Statistic

Sum of Squares

Df

Mean Square

F

Significance

Regression

69.82

2

19.95

22.08

0.00

Residual

4.364

23

6.321



Total

71.19

25