Are Married Men Healthier than Single Women? A Gender Comparison of the Health Effects of Marriage and Marital Satisfaction in East Asia

Abstract

Background: Although Asian societies are remarkably different from Western societies in terms of sociocultural characteristics, little is known about the gender differences in the health effects of marriage and marital satisfaction in Asian countries.

Methodology/principal findings: Using a randomly sampled dataset from the 2006 East Asian Social Survey comprising 8528 individuals from China, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea, this study performs analyses using a multivariate logistic regression model to predict the probability for a man or a woman to report poor health. Our results differ quite significantly from those of most studies focusing on Western countries. Considering marital satisfaction, there may be no health benefits from marriage for a specific gender in a given country, because the health loss associated with a dissatisfied marriage usually supersedes the health benefits from marriage. Moreover, women may reap greater health benefits from marriage than men. Additionally, those most likely to report poor health are found to be married and dissatisfied men or women, rather than never-married individuals.

Conclusion/significance: The present study argues the need to design and carry out a gender- and country-specific social health policy approach to target individuals suffering from poor health, thereby reducing the gender differences in health status.

Fig 1. Predicted probability (and 95% confidence intervals) of reporting poor health by gender in China, the 2006 East Asian Social Survey.

Fig 2. Predicted probability (and 95% confidence intervals) of reporting poor health by gender in Japan, the 2006 East Asian Social Survey.

Fig 3. Predicted probability (and 95% confidence intervals) of reporting poor health by gender in Taiwan, the 2006 East Asian Social Survey.

Fig 4. Predicted probability (and 95% confidence intervals) of reporting poor health by gender in South Korea, the 2006 East Asian Social Survey.