Marriage and Longevity.(married men live longer and stay healthier)(Brief Article)

That married people live longer and healthier lives than do the non-married is "one of the most robust results in demography," writes John E. Murray of the University of Toledo in the pages of Demography (Vol. 37, No. 4, November 2000). Murray notes, however, that debate persists: Does marriage actually contribute to health--the "protective effect" most previous studies have found--or is there a "selective bias"--that is, are healthy people simply likelier to marry?

Murray's was an unusually rich sample: height and weight data from 1,961 male graduates of Amherst College who were born between 1832 and 1879. Physiologists are in. general agreement that height and …