Chapter 3 - Courtship And Dating: Preludes To Marriage

This night, I called Sarah, my daughter, to my chamber and spoke to her of her forthcoming state of matrimony. It had concerned me, as I had imagined that Sarah entertained a preference which would have been wholly unsuitable to her complacency. The matter, nonetheless, was terminated to our mutual agreement.

Young John Gow had spoken this day. I informed Sarah, and congratulated her upon receiving the attentions of this sober and industrious young man. Upon hearing this information, Sarah evidenced some little obstinacy. John's appearance was not entirely agreeable to her, his attentions were lacking, and he was ill at ease with the Meeting group. This gave me the opportunity to enlighten Sarah who, I felt, had been displaying some favor toward Thomas. Thomas is a young rascal, well favored, lazy, and possessing an eye which roves toward females during Meeting. He is not husbandly but his veins flow warm. We did not mention his name between us, but I spoke to Sarah of the meaning of matrimony and showed to her conclusively that a fair face and gallant attentions are of little worth at home. Always, she may expect to lean upon John and find support. In her children there will be no taint, and John, being the eldest, will receive the half of his father's property, as he related to me. As I would not force Sarah, my daughter, into the nuptial bed with anyone distasteful to her, it was with comfort, at the close of this discourse, that I heard her say, "Yes, father," and I forthwith dismissed her from my chamber.

Thus wrote one of the early American patriarchs, in his diary, about the courting of his daughter. Though the words may sound labored, their meaning is clear. Young John is old enough and is in a position to marry. Sarah is his choice. So he asks her father for permission to pay court to her. Once this is granted and Sarah agrees, everyone—the family, the neighbors, the Meeting group—knows that John is "wooing" Sarah. His intention? Marriage, of course. Something could happen to prevent the wedding thereafter, but it is not very likely. Sarah's father already assumes her "forthcoming state," and so will Sarah and the neighbors and the Meeting group. Another "good and sensible" marriage is about to be consummated.

To modern American ears, this sounds cold, formal, impersonal, and calculating. They would perhaps rather hear Sarah say "Oh! No, John," than "Yes, Father," as long as she has Thomas in her blood. There is always a chance that Father was wrong; that Thomas will "prove himself"; and that he and Sarah will live happily ever after.

Only yesterday, a conversation like the following probably occurred somewhere in the United States. "Goodnight, Dad. I won't be late. See you in the morning." "Wait a minute, Anne. When are you going to bring home this young fellow who's been dating you every other night? How serious are you two, anyway? You know, your mother and I do have some interest in meeting the boys you run around with and knowing something about them."

What would Sarah think about this? For one thing, it would be difficult for her to understand how a girl, living in her own home, could possibly be meeting a lad who is unknown to her parents. She would also wonder what was meant by "how serious" they were. If they are not thinking of matrimony, what on earth are they thinking of every other night, and where do they go? Sarah would probably take a dim view of this situation. She might feel quite concerned over the future of this strange girl and more than a little smug that she had made a safe choice within the bounds of propriety.

What has happened during the passing years so to change the attitudes and patterns of courtship? Why has the very word "courtship" become practically defunct (except in books of this nature) and been replaced by the word "dating"? What is dating? Are there problems inherent in it that affect young people? How is it related to marital selection? How effective is it as a device for selecting a lifelong partner? These are some of the questions that will be raised in this chapter.

Changing Patterns of Life

It is easier to get to know one's neighbors in the country than it is in the city. Yet between the middle of the last century and the middle of this one, the proportion of people in the United States who live in the country and in the city has been almost completely reversed. In 1880, 70.5 per cent of our population lived in rural areas; by 1950, 63.7 per cent lived in urban areas. This has meant a great change in the way of living for the major part of our family population, and it has influenced courtship.

For instance, in a country sparsely populated (there were only 23,260,000 people in the United States in 1850; in 1950 there were over 150,000,000), how much chance did young people who lived in a small rural village or on a big farm have to meet strangers of their own age? Indeed, the presence of a stranger, under such circumstances, was so rare that all eyes centered upon him with suspicion. Only if he "behaved himself" would his presence be acceptable, and he had just better not get out of line. No, in such a rural situation people grew up together in successive generations and everyone knew all about everyone else—their family backgrounds, their characters, their personalities, their social and financial statuses, and even their prospects for the future. Sarah's father, for instance, had all these facts well settled in his mind in approving John and distrusting Thomas; and Sarah herself, perhaps, complied partly because she really did know the "scores" of these two boys.

Girls who come from relatively isolated rural areas of our country tell us that even today, though their fathers do not directly select their mates, the pressure of the family and community is very strong when a girl goes out with a lad who is "known" to be an undesirable character. The boys from such places say that they, too, have to be very careful. One reported: "If you are considered a nice boy and you call on a nice, marriageable girl three nights in succession, you are practically trapped. The neighbors expect a wedding before long, and if there is none you are branded as a philanderer, not to be trusted by other nice young girls." Interestingly enough, it is in the conversations with these girls and boys only that the word "courting" has been noted as a survival with real meaning. Casual dating is accepted only up to a certain point. If it occurs frequently and intensively with one person, then the couple are courting. After all, the feeling seems to be that, since these young people have known each other, and all about each other, from early childhood on, they must know by this time whether they want to marry. What conceivable purposes are there in prolonged dallying?

City life, on the other hand, has become increasingly a matter of living among strangers and, too often, with them. What do I really know about the family who last year moved into the apartment next door, just six months after I had moved in—particularly if the walls are sound-proofed and the people behave respectably when I pass them in the hall or invite them in to tea? Such is the mobility of city people that before many years all of us will have moved to another place anyway and live next door to someone else. This picture of mobility becomes less true in the case of suburban living, but only relatively less. Populations are constantly changing in the formerly settled areas surrounding all our major cities. So boy meets girl in neighborhood or school, and they are attracted to each other. They have not grown up together. They may have met only last week, and their parents have not met at all. In such a case, the couple know relatively little about each other, and little pressure can come from the family and community that know even less about the young people concerned.

Added to this, our present mode of life makes it very difficult to predict the future efficiency of a girl or boy as a wife or husband. When life was agricultural, as well as rural, families remained at home together. Children learned from their parents the things they had to know in order to support and rear their own families later. The boys learned farming; the girls, housekeeping and child-rearing. By the time they had reached teen age, it was fairly easy to tell how effective these adolescents would be as adults. Now that life has become industrialized, as well as urban, the matter is not so simple. Most occupations are engaged in away from home, as is the learning of the specialized skills to perform them. The learning takes much longer, too, so that young people frequently fall in love and want to marry while they have not yet finished their education.

Here is a case in point. Claire and Ronny were taking the same course in college when they began dating. Before long they decided they wanted to get married, but realized it would not be easy. They did not have parents who could "subsidize" their marriage, and Ronny had a long way to go before he entered, and graduated from, law school. In April of their senior year, Ronny received a tuition and subsistence scholarship to law school. They then decided that if Claire could get a job they would be married at City Hall with as little formality and expense as possible. Claire, now the owner of a Phi Beta Kappa key, had little trouble in getting a research appointment at the same college. Everything was set! Throughout the summer they "existed," blissfully, on Claire's salary; and two months after Ronny entered law school Claire discovered that she was pregnant. She was very much upset. She had not anticipated having her life with Ronny become domestic, and she had no desire to become a homemaker. At the same time, Ronny discovered that the rigors of law school were greater than he had assumed, and that he had too little time for study. There were always the household chores which he had to take over because Claire felt that during pregnancy she must reserve her strength for her job—without which they would not even be able to pay for, and support, the baby. At the end of that year, Ronny's scholarship was in jeopardy, but was continued. By the following autumn, his life was further complicated by the presence of the baby. At the end of the term, Ronny not only lost his scholarship but was "advised" that he did not have the qualities which are necessary to his chosen profession and that he should select some line of work more suitable to his ability and personality. Ronny then admitted that he had become a master in cheating his way through undergraduate school and had thus acquired the grades for the scholarship. Law school, however, was a different matter. He found a low-paying and unspectacular job; but when Claire discovered that she could get a two-year position in Europe at a high salary, she had no intention of remaining at home as an obscure domestic, and went off to follow her career, leaving the baby with her mother. Ronny is appalled that Claire could be so unwifely and unmotherly as to have done this; and Claire is equally disappointed in Ronny.

Not only is it harder for young people to predict the potentialities of their future mates, but also it is more difficult for parents to give helpful advice. How could Ronny's mother, a housewife since she left high school, anticipate what kind of woman her Anthropology-Major prospective daughter-in-law might become, and especially since they rarely saw each other? How could Claire's father, a carpenter, feel qualified to tell his daughter that Ronny would be a poor financial risk? Even had these parents, with true insight, warned their children, they would probably have been answered with "Oh! You just don't understand these things. Life is different now." As indeed it is. It is still true, however, that to know a boy or girl intellectually and as a physical being is not necessarily to understand him or her as a prospective mate and parent.

This suggests one other aspect of modern life important to changing courtship patterns and attitudes—the individualistic philosophy of our country. Although individualism is the subject for a later chapter, there should be added here the fact that nowadays people have the "right" to form their own opinions and to make their own decisions, even if they lead to tragedy. Anything else is considered an infringement on human liberty. And what decision is more private and intimate than the selection of a marital partner? To our young people, this is a right to be most zealously guarded, and it is often interpreted so broadly as to mean that even "advice" is anathema when it runs counter to personal desires. Sometimes such advice results merely in making an independent-minded young person stubborn, even though he suspects there may be some merit in the advice. One evidence of this is the number of young people, whose parents object to their prospective mates, who visit a marriage counselor, but not really with the intent of weighing the pros and cons of the matter. Instead, they complain about their parents' lack of understanding, their selfishness in wishing to keep their children at home with them, their "narrow-minded" conceptions of modern marriage. These young folks want the counselor, supposedly an expert in such matters, to tell them that their parents are mistaken. Rarely will a wise counselor do this at first meeting, with the result that he loses his client before a second one.

So, in summarizing the above discussion, it might be said that there are historical reasons for the changes in courtship patterns. Most parents cannot know their children's friends nor the families nor the future prospects as they once could.

Young people think they know them better and that they have the right to their own choice without listening to old-fashioned notions. They do seem to wish, however, that they could get assurance, from some experienced adult, that parents are wrong and that the marriage will be a good one.

From Courtship to Dating

The changing patterns of life have spelled the doom of the older courtship practices as a means of mate selection. There has been no change, however, in the need for wise marriage selection. It is universal and is fundamental to any healthy society. A dating system thus began to emerge in our country. If the older generation cannot, or is not permitted to, do the guiding, then young people themselves must have some way of meeting and learning to know as much as possible about others from among whom they may choose a mate.

This is not to say that Youth Groups met and organized formal sessions to set up plans for a dating system. That is not the way in which new social habits come into being. Often they start through accident, coincidence, or trial-and-error behavior. They then seem to fill some need, maybe just pleasure, and they begin to grow, to become more complicated, and also more rigid. Once they have gained momentum, they are difficult to control through conscious planning. They just go on growing in their own merry way, and usually accrue byproducts which were never dreamed of when the first pleasurable feelings in them were experienced.

Perhaps it will not completely spoil all joy in next Saturday night's date to think about the dating system as being a relatively new way of behavior, and to take a look at its beginning, growth, and by-products.

Actually, young people did not "date" (according to our use of that term) until during World War I. Then there came a new kind of freedom for women. For the first time, thousands of them separated from their families, took all sorts of jobs to increase needed "manpower," rented rooms and apartments for themselves, and lived in financial and social freedom from older restraints. The chaperone, that well-known institution, had almost met her fate. Young men and women went out alone, where they pleased, and with whom they pleased. Such a sudden change in behavior was conspicuous and shocking to a great many people; and, of course, it occurred first among groups of the most liberal-minded or rebellious young folks. There is little wonder, then, that dating was considered by many young people as a period of exploitation of the sexes by each other until such time as they could find some suitable person with whom to fall in love, marry, and settle down. Dating concerned the exploitation of the boys by the girls for mercenary favors; and of the girls by the boys, for physical favors. The Gold-digger and the Casanova "dated." If any of them happened to fall in love during the process, they no longer dated. They "courted." There was a clear distinction between the motives and behavior involved in the two. Dating was a period of mere dalliance, and served no useful purpose.

This was the description of dating given by Dr. Willard Waller, the first author who included a discussion of it in a book on the family. For some time afterward, students of marriage considered that dating was a dangerous prelude to marriage, the reason being that thrill-seeking became a habit and an expectation not to be found in married life.

Then, during the succeeding years, dating became epidemic. It spread out from the Bohemian fringe to all groups of young people, and to younger and younger people. The nature of it was changing, and it became a subject of great interest for study, particularly in colleges and universities where its popularity was so obvious. In answer to thousands of questions, "daters" themselves gave a very clear picture of what dating had come to mean to them. Some few still regarded it merely as fun or thrill-seeking; but others took a more serious view of it. The younger ones regarded it as an opportunity to get into the social swim—a sort of enlarging of the playground, at a later age, with a minimum of adult supervision, a chance to get to know more members of the opposite sex and to engage in more social relationships with them. Those who were more mature in the dating system spoke of it as a means of selecting the most suitable mate—a narrowing down of social relations. Furthermore, these young people made no distinction between dating as an uncommitted relationship and courtship as one with serious intentions. Their picture of it then, in summary, is that of a system which has real purpose and fulfills their needs to know the opposite sex, and which permits them to correct a mistaken choice right up to the day of marriage.

Meeting New Needs

How, specifically, does dating serve the needs of boys and girls? Here is an example. Jayne enters a high school in which there are several thousand students. She is fourteen years old, has no brothers, and has formerly spent her out-of-school hours in "playing with the kids," a few of whom are boys. Now she is within sight of the end of her education, unless she intends going to college, and pretty soon she will be out in the cold, cold world. Ever since she was a small child she has absorbed from the very air she breathed that, in the natural course of events, one grows up and gets married. That is what most Americans do, and those who don't are considered a little out of line. Jayne looks at the seniors in her school. To her they seem like very mature, sophisticated, and self-confident individuals. The girls know just what to say to the boys, and it is quite different from the way Jayne has always talked with "the kids." The seniors pair off. They talk about where they are going this week end. They discuss their boy friends and their girl friends and their degree of interest in them. Jayne thinks, "You have to be like this before someone asks you to marry; but I've never even had a date, and I don't know how to talk to or act with older boys who date." Jayne feels anything but self-assured. How is she ever going to become the kind of girl that the boys want to ask out? Will anyone out of the hundreds of boys she sees every day, but scarcely knows, ever really ask her for a date, or is she destined, horror of horrors, to be a dateless old maid? It is all her own problem, too, because it is up to her alone to find a husband. No one is going to present her with one.

Then, wonder of wonders, a classmate invites her to a school party. It doesn't much matter to Jayne who he is because she now has her first chance. However, the anticipation carries as much dread as delight. Suppose that this boy and all the others at the party discover that she is a creep, and have nothing to do with her any more. That would be even worse than having no date at all. If Jayne has the right kind of family relationships, she begins asking her parents' opinions on all the things she is uncertain about. She also talks to the other girls who are going to the party, and they exchange ideas on very important issues, such as what to wear, how late they should ask to stay out, what sort of girl a particular boy likes, etc., etc. At the party she has a good time, but she notices that she does make some mistakes that the other girls do not, and she determines to correct these. Also, although the boy who took her was very nice, she did not like him as well as that other one who paid so much attention to her. She hopes that he will ask her for a date sometime, and is so glad that she has already had one and will know more about what to do on the next one.

Jayne has been getting an "education." The content of it is nonacademic, but it is very important to her. By the end of the following year, she may have the experience that most girls have, of going out on a double date including a younger girl. And Jayne will look at her and smile, seeing her make the same little errors that Jayne herself made the year before. She knows much more now about how to behave and how to get along with boys than she did then, and feels much more comfortable. One just has to know how to get along with girls and boys before one has a chance to meet a number of them in private, face-to-face situations.

Once these sorts of relationships are established, and they are by the average person by the end of high school, dating continues in an attempt to meet another important need. Out of all these boys and girls, which are the kinds that are most liked and most suitable for a future mate to any given individual? Experience in selection now becomes important.

A mother of an eight-year-old girl appreciated this particular selective function of the dating system. Stell had developed a crush on her eleven-year-old brother's friend, who scorned to recognize her existence. The girl confided to her mother that she was in love with Peter and wanted to marry him when she grew up. It was explained that though she thought she loved Peter now, girls meet many different boys while they are growing up and that this is the only way to discover which one of them is really the right one. She would probably love Peter for a little while, then someone else, and someone else, until she found the person she wanted for always. Years later, when Stell, at seventeen, was going through a rapid succession of infatuations and her mother became slightly upset about it, her daughter reminded her of her advice during the Peter episode. "You said that is what would happen, and it is happening. Don't take it so seriously!"

A boy in the junior class of a large university, already well established in the dating system, describes with frankness how it has now become a matter of selection for him. He writes:

Alice is twenty. She is extremely pretty and always seems to create a very happy atmosphere with everyone she comes in contact with. She is extremely religious and loves her work. She is not well read, nor can I carry on a discussion with her of anything deeply philosophic. She is not stimulated by art, nor does she seem to care about current political and world developments. She shows a very fervent love for children and is a very direct and genuine person.

Edna is twenty-six. She is a graduate of an exclusive college and lives in an exclusive section of the city. She is doing graduate work in anthropology. She is pretty, intelligent, and very congenial. We can get together over many quarts of beer and solve everything from the idea of God in Plato, to the choice of a replacement of Rex Harrison in "My Fair Lady." Whenever I feel in the mood for a good mental tussle and a well-cooked supper, I find myself at Edna's.

Billie is twenty-three and in her second year of pre-med. She is the "drinker" in my Rogue's Gallery. Whenever I take her out we either go to a party or to the campus bar and get pleasantly "tight." Then we can relax, confess our doubts to each other about ever having the ability and perseverance it takes to achieve our goals. She and I are, in that respect, each other's stabilizing factors, for we have many mutual problems and conflicts.

Alma is a post-deb, sparkling and amusing. She is a party girl who is sexually attractive and very willing to engage in petting. She is well read, knows a good deal about art and music, and can carry on just about any type of conversation. She becomes, however, very artificial at times in her overenthusiastic way of reciting her repertoire of campus sayings, banalities, and gossip. Her indiscriminate petting has made her rather popular around campus, and whenever I am with her I have the strange feeling that I am being pointed at.

Erica is pure sex and free love. She is twenty-one and has an undisturbed hedonistic philosophy. She has no inhibitions about sex, and seems to treat it as a very natural and simple activity which deserves a place in life. With me, she is the girl best described by the connotations of the saying, "Live now, for you're a long time dead."

And Gracie is the girl back home. She is a pert blonde who teaches school. She loves children, art, music, and is a specialist in Spinoza and Hemingway. She dresses well, dances well, and is extremely popular. Whenever I'm home, she and I play golf together, play bridge together, and we argue together. She has no formal or institutional religion, but has a stronger set of values than many who "claim" a faith. She is a happy, healthy, wholesome girl who seems to be able to give life a purpose.

Somewhere along the route from his first attempts at getting to know girls in general, this lad has come to the point of learning a considerable amount about specific girls.

Dating has been educative, then, for young people who have to handle the large problem of their future by themselves. This may not be the best possible way of educating for marriage. It may have its weaknesses (and we shall refer to some of them); but it is nevertheless the one most generally open to young Americans.

The By-Products

A new system, once it gains momentum, is hard to control, and it accrues by-products that were not anticipated and that are not always desirable. Such has been the case with dating. There are all sorts of problems involved for the dating individuals; but just a few of a rather general nature may be mentioned here.

One of these problems comes from the fact that once dating had become accepted it also became expected. It was this that caused a part of Jayne's panic when at the ripe old age of fourteen she had not yet had a date. If everyone else is doing it and you are out of it, it is worse than turning up at a Blue Jeans party in a strapless formal. It not only makes you stand out but also carries the stigma that there is something wrong with your personality. Factually this is not necessarily so. Many a boy and girl who have not been popular with their age mates at fourteen, or even twenty, develop later into very attractive and popular people, and have made good marriages— perhaps better than they might have earlier. However, the danger is that the teenager himself may be convinced that there is something irreparably wrong with him. Since this burden falls more heavily on girls, who have to wait to be asked, than on boys, who can keep on asking until they find some date, this problem is illustrated by the case history of a now forty-year-old unmarried woman. She alone of all her close girl friends in school had been unappealing to the opposite sex. She was, to begin with, quite homely. It was beyond her candid nature to adopt coy or flirtatious behavior.

Her intellect was far superior to that of "the crowd," and she did not attempt to conceal it. She had definite, rather mature, and sensible opinions about most important things and did not hesitate to express them with positiveness. She liked to do things well, was intolerant of sloppy work in any area, and spent much time perfecting whatever she attempted. At one time, during high school, she received a package from all the boys in her class. Inside it was a large, ripe pineapple. This was the only gift she ever received from boys. No one ever asked to date her. Her girl friends, unhappy about this, "snared" blind date after blind date, so that she could go out with them. Not one of the dates ever went with her twice. It was not long, in such a situation, before she became so self-conscious in the presence of a young male that she lost her poise completely. She became tongue-tied and even her muscles tensed so that she became awkward. Then she started avoiding boys altogether and developed a very antagonistic attitude toward the whole sex. Having once graduated from college, with men crossed off her list, she relaxed into a good job, a pleasant social life (strictly female), and an interest in children and housekeeping. Now that all her friends have been married for some time, their husbands wonder why this woman never married. They think of her as a "grand girl," an interesting and nice person from a good family, a potentially successful wife, mother, and homemaker (just the qualities that would have made John's parents urge him to consider Sarah as a prospect for courtship). Often they have invited eligible men to their homes when she was visiting, and they cannot understand why she suddenly becomes a different person. Back come the self-conscious awkwardness, the tied tongue, and the more than faint hostility characteristic of her teenage experience. She has been deprived, and has deprived some eligible man, of a good marriage. They may be more fortunate, though, than the boys and girls who snatch in desperation at the only available date and marry with no thought of the unsuitability of the match nor of the possibility of a better one, had they waited a while until they matured.

A second problem that has arisen in the dating system is an economic one. It is expensive—for the boys. It seems that the male is expected to foot all the bills while dating, to an even greater extent than he is in marriage, at the present time. Even the growing customs of the Dutch Treat and Coke parties in girls' homes have done little to lessen the expense for a boy who wishes to date an ever changing number of girls. Most boys seem to agree that the first few dates with a girl must be impressive ones, and that only after going with one for some time is it permissible to include frequent free dates. If a boy starts dating early in his teens, and continues into his twenties, he, or his family, may literally spend more than a thousand dollars just in entertaining girls (a nice little nest egg, that might otherwise be put away for marriage). Some affluent families do not complain about this. Others, while paying for their children's upkeep and education at the same time, just cannot afford it. Many boys find jobs during all the longer vacations from school, just in order to have the necessary funds for dating. It is highly probable that many a very eligible lad gets lost in the dating process merely because he cannot afford impressive dating.

The two problems already mentioned—the psychological hazards for the girls and the expense for the boys—have led directly into still a third problem, "going steady." This is the problem most discussed by young people and adults at the moment. Verdicts cover a wide range. One mother thinks it "very nice" that her daughter has someone to depend upon to take her places. Another tersely dismisses it as "absurd!" Still another wonders why people are so excited about it. It is just another "phase" that young folks will outgrow, like so many other phases. A teenager remarks that it makes for security and cuts down on his expenses. Another one thinks that it is a "disgusting rule" that prevents her from dating other boys but makes her feel "promiscuous" if she tries to. The Roman Catholic church takes such a dim view of its effects on moral behavior that four students were recently expelled from a Catholic school for going steady. Yet Dr. Cole, the President of Amherst College, finds in the "fiercely monogamous premarital folkways" a behavior pattern that may carry over into married life and stabilize it. Dr. Robert Herman, of the University of Wisconsin, after having 193 questionnaires on the subject answered by as many students, states that there seem to be two kinds of "going steady." One has matrimonial intentions. The second does not. The various motives for it may be covered by describing it as "dalliance." Obviously parents, teenagers, church leaders, college presidents, and students of the family take the dating system very seriously. Going steady has created quite a furore! Any teenager who wants an unequivocal and definitive answer about its real effects is apt to be disappointed, for the only answer seems to be, "It depends."

First, if the early stages of dating are meant to fulfill the need of learning to associate easily with many of the opposite sex, steady dating denies this need. Yet, for those who are fearful of their acceptance into the expected dating system, it does spell security. Some of these will find the steady a mere steppingstone to secure relations with other young people. For them it truly is a "phase," and one that has been helpful. Others, though, will find it not a steppingstone but a quagmire. Unable to make other associations, they will cling in a possessive panic to the one; and putting all one's emotional eggs in one basket very often leads to exactly what the Roman Catholic church suggests it does. To put the above to the test of logic—which does not always produce the right answers-it would follow that it is the most insecure among the youth group who insist upon the practice of going steady. It not only adds to their comfort but it reduces competition. It follows, then, that the more successful they are in producing strong local pressure, the more comfortable they are, and the more they are denying the socially secure youngsters their chances of exploring the field.

As an illustration, here is the story of a roly-poly, thirteen-year-old girl with braces on her teeth who, within the space of a year, developed into a slim and pretty creature who caught the eye of every boy in her class at school. Her mother watched with pleasure as these boys tagged home after her and invited her to informal affairs, because the mother felt that the girl had had an unusually easy entrance into a new world that is normal and healthy. The boys were all rather gauche, but time would change that. Then, one day, Dorrie told her mother that from now on there would be dates with no one else except Harold—one of the more gauche of the school set. Upon inquiry, Dome's mother learned that all the other girls in the class, less attractive than Dorrie and less sought after, had instituted the rule of going steady. Moreover, they had chosen Dorrie's steady for her, and had insisted that they would ostracize her as heartless if she did not choose Harold since he, more than all the other boys, was "deeply in love" with her. It was obvious that Dorrie herself had no liking for this system; but she was caught between the pleading of her mother to ignore her classmates' rules and the fear of social exile if she did. Harold gloried in being the steady of the most attractive girl in the school, and pushed his advantage for all it was worth. Dorrie, who had many secret offers of dates from more interesting boys, grew more and more moody and dissatisfied. Finally, with Dorrie's consent, her mother sent her to another school where she was less conspicuous among the other girls and so was permitted to date as she pleased.

Again, Dr. Herman's statement that there are two kinds of going steady deserves consideration. One is described above. It occurs during the first stages of dating, and with various results. The other carries matrimonial intentions from the start. Most often this happens when young men and women are in a position to marry. However, that is not always the case. There are, even in modern America, some very young people whose behavior is very much like the older courtship pattern. Quite early in life they find someone they want to marry, and nothing changes their minds. The more they know each other, their families, their friends, the more they want to marry. Their families and friends approve, too. But such are the exigencies of the modern industrial world that it takes some years before they are able to support themselves as husband and wife. So, in the meantime, they go steady. It seems very probable that Dr. Cole's suggestion that their "fiercely monogamous premarital folkways" will carry over into a very stable married life is justified. They have certainly had an opportunity to know each other and all about each other that closely approximates an earlier era during which marriages were more stable than at present.

This leads naturally to the mention of another problem that has arisen around dating, and one which is perhaps most important of all in its effects on marriage. What are the criteria for a good date? Are they the same as for a good mate? Is the atmosphere of the ordinary dating situation apt to give true light on the latter characteristics? Or do young people too often fall in love with a person who rates as a date but has none of the qualities that make for success in marriage? The authors have come to the conclusion that one cannot give a generalized answer. What rates, in dating, seems to be a purely local affair, and differs greatly from place to place.

However, it does seem that the closer the place is to urban conditions (where most of our young people live and go to school), the more superficial are the qualities that lead to dating popularity. Again, this is perhaps inherent in the nature of urban life. There dating seldom takes place in an atmosphere of homemaking or earning a living. It is much more a party affair: movies, theaters, dances, spectator sports, jam sessions, automobile rides, etc., etc. An occasional baby-sitting job or doing the dishes after dinner is about the closest that urban dating gets to the real conditions of married life. Furthermore, such is the radiating influence of the city and the automobile that they are increasingly affecting the dating life of rural young folks. Many serious-minded teenagers have said that they want to marry someone with a stable personality who is dependable, trustworthy, loves home and children, and so forth. But how is one to discover these qualities in another at the movies or on a dance floor? During jam session? Well, it is true that one can "talk things over" and swap attitudes about marriage. Such sessions, though, are really only intellectual in nature, and dating is a time of wanting to put forward one's best foot rather than always stating the simple truth. A lad, for instance, who wants to keep on dating a girl who loves children is not apt to tell her that he hates the little brats, but, rather, to leave the settling of that problem until after he has won the girl.

A college student, at one time, objected very heatedly to a suggestion in the classroom that the dating atmosphere was artificial. "But," she protested, "Mort and I can sit for a whole evening, quite happily, and discuss Ancient European History. We don't see each other only at parties! We are intellectual companions, and that should be a good basis for marriage." To her surprise, the class tittered. It is not hard to imagine why. They probably had a mental image of this couple getting the children to bed, going over the bills, clearing up the living-room and then, at a weary 10:00 p.m. sitting down in intellectual companionship to discuss Ancient History. How well they saw the point when a fellow-classmate objectified the problem for them. How well they can objectify the same problem for themselves is another matter.

This is one aspect of mate selection about which young people might well give an ear to the comments of their elders on "John versus Thomas." For there are certain eternal verities in marriage that the elders have experienced. They are apt to be sensitive to attitudes toward childbirth and child-rearing, mutual responsibility, mutual respect for the roles of husband and wife, home-planning, family maintenance, loyalty to the family group, and self-forgetfulness in the face of others' needs. These attitudes, and others, parents know are of basic value, and they tend to look for evidences of them in young people rather than for personable appearance, dancing ability, and intellectual fervor. Often it is the experienced eye that can see the truth through the haze of intellectual declamation.

As a last word, it might be said that the dating system is still in a state of changing. It is not exactly the same in any two places in the United States, nor in any two decades. It is just a baby as yet, and grows and changes as fast. Who knows how it will appear ten years from now? Parents, now complaining about their children going steady, may live to see those same children, as parents, agitated over the "promiscuous" dating habits of the next generation. At any rate, whatever happens will be an attempt to adjust to the problem of modern youth who must find and choose his own mate with little else to go on except immaturity and inexperience. At least, "dating," the substitute for "courtship," has this merit. It offers during the process of education an opportunity to erase one's past mistakes with a minimum of censure and emotional scar, and to move on to another, better try. Courtship is committal. Dating is not. Breach-of-promise suits are rare nowadays. A broken engagement is forgotten in a year. Youth may have to flounder in, but can swim out. This, of course, can lead to an attitude that regards no relationship as necessarily permanent. However, if the educative purpose in the dating system is understood and is taken seriously, and "just dating" relatively less seriously, it can be of some definite aid to American youth in marital selection.

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