Dissolution risks in first and higher order marital and cohabiting unions

More and more people enter multiple unions during their lives, and then they may choose to either cohabit or marry. We examine the implications of this diversity in partnership trajectories by assessing dissolution risks in first and higher order marital and cohabiting unions. We use recent Norwegian survey data that contain complete retrospective union histories. We find that, when selectivity is accounted for, higher-order unions are not less stable than first unions. When dissolution risks for all possible partnership trajectories are compared, we find that former cohabitants who cohabit in a second union are as likely to break up as they were in their first cohabiting union. As soon as they enter marriage in their second unions, however, they do slightly better than first married persons. The previously married experience higher dissolution risks in their second union compared to their first, regardless of their current union type.