The Future Family Desires of Single Early Midlife Adults

Singlehood is on the rise, with one in three early midlife adults neither married nor cohabiting. However, most have experienced some family-building behaviors, making these singles a heterogeneous group. We drew on the life course perspective to assess how earlier family-building experiences were related to future family desires. Using a 2023 survey of U.S. single, early midlife adults aged 30–50 (N = 799), we investigated the linkages between prior marital experience, prior cohabitation experience, and having had a child with desires to form a new union using multinomial logistic regression. We also assessed how these same family experiences were related to desires to have a(nother) child using logistic regression. Early midlife singles varied in their relationship desires, with more wanting to cohabit with a partner than any other option, although substantial shares were either uncertain about their desires or simply did not want to cohabit or marry. Prior cohabitation experience was positively associated with wanting to form a union. Most early midlife single adults did not want to have a child and prior family experiences were immaterial to their fertility desires. A one-size-fits-all relationship trajectory does not apply to early midlife single adults.