6 Minute English / Divorce: Why does it happen?

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript.

Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I m Phil.

And I m Georgie.

In the words of a famous 1960s pop song, breaking up is hard to do . Divorce, when a married couple who no longer want to be together separate, can be one of life s toughest experiences.

During the 1990s, divorce rates in Europe and America were the highest in the world, with almost half of all marriages ending in divorce. But since then, the trend has reversed and divorce rates in the West have slowed. Meanwhile, however, the number of couples divorcing in other parts of the world is on the rise.

In this programme we ll be hearing how divorce is talked about in different countries. And, as usual, we ll be learning some useful new vocabulary. But first, I have a question for you, Georgie. In Britain, one day of the year in particular is known by divorce lawyers and relationship counsellors as Divorce Day , but which day is it?

a) Christmas Day?b) the first Monday of the new year? or,c) Midsummer s Day, the 24th of June?

Hmm, I think Divorce Day is the first Monday of the year.

OK, Georgie. We ll find out if that s the correct answer later in the programme. Getting married very young, and differences between partners backgrounds or interests are two common causes for couples to grow apart. Today, Marina Adshade is a professor at the University of British Columbia who studies the economics of sex and relationships, but her life has a very different beginning, as she told BBC World Service programme, The Global Story:

I married really young, I had no education, I married somebody who is older than me, who had a lot of education and our relationship worked well for a while. And then in my late 20s I decided to go back to school, I no longer wanted to be a stay-at-home mother which was what I was doing in my 20s, and that change in our situation for us just became completely unresolvable. And I think this is true for a lot of marriages because people s situation changes over their lives, maybe they want children then maybe they change their minds.