Key Takeaways

• Two new studies from the Institute for Family Studies reveal the twin forces driving America’s dating recession from opposite directions: technology is pulling young men away from social connection and marriage, while a cultural narrative of heteropessimism is convincing young women that men and marriage are more trouble than they’re worth.

• Research from the University of Cincinnati found a measurable link between 4G internet adoption and declining marriage rates among non-college-educated men. The increase in screen time mostly displaced time with friends — and fewer friendships meant fewer marriages.

• Unmarried, childless women in their 20s and 30s are nearly three times more likely to be unhappy compared to married mothers the same age, according to General Social Survey data. Heteropessimism really is a trap — but the culture is not telling young women that.

• Nearly a quarter of young men now gamble daily. More than two in five watch pornography every day. About the same share play video games daily. These habits are not replacing work — they are replacing relationships.

• The church is uniquely positioned to provide the real-life relational experiences and human connection skills that young adults are losing to screens and cultural cynicism. Communio can help your church build the ministry strategy to reach them.

The Research: Two Studies, One Crisis

Two recent articles from the Institute for Family Studies — published weeks apart — together paint a picture of the dating recession that is more complete, and more urgent, than either one tells alone.

The first, by Robert VerBruggen of the Manhattan Institute, covers a new working paper by economists Nathan Hudson and Hernan Moscoso Boedo from the University of Cincinnati. Their research examines one specific question: does high-speed internet access reduce marriage rates? The answer, with important caveats, is yes — particularly for men who were already less likely to marry.

The second, by Maria Baer and Brad Wilcox, addresses a trend building on the other side of the dating equation: the rise of heteropessimism among young women — a growing conviction that men are not worth the trouble, that marriage is a losing proposition, and that independence is a more reliable path to a fulfilling life. The data tells a different story. But the culture is not offering young women that story. The local church can.

The Core Finding: Screens Are Replacing Friendships — and Friendships Lead to Marriage

Hudson and Boedo’s approach is clever. They use the rollout of 4G mobile internet as a natural experiment — different regions adopted it at different speeds, which means some young adults came of age in a high-4G environment and some didn’t. Starting with cohorts that came of age after 4G debuted, there is an increasingly strong link between early 4G adoption and lower marriage rates for non-college-educated men.

The mechanism is not what most people would assume. Screen time did not primarily displace work. It displaced time with friends and other forms of social leisure. And fewer friendships, fewer face-to-face social interactions, and less time spent in the kinds of casual community settings where relationships form naturally — these are what translated into fewer marriages.

The picture that emerges from survey data makes the pattern concrete. Nearly a quarter of young men now gamble daily. More than two in five watch pornography every day. About the same share play video games daily. These are not substitute careers. They are substitute relationships — low-commitment, high-stimulation digital experiences that occupy the hours previously spent in the kind of social proximity that leads to friendship, then courtship, then marriage.

Guys do not quit their jobs to stare at their phones, as VerBruggen notes, but these habits do hold up their relationships — especially for men who were not strong marriage prospects to begin with. The result is a generation of young men less practiced in the relational skills that relationships require, less embedded in the social networks where they meet potential partners, and less likely to make the transition from single to married that previous generations made as a matter of course.

The Counterintuitive Angle: The Culture Is Offering Young Women the Amazonian Strategy. The Data Says It Leads Somewhere They Don’t Want to Go.

Now turn to the young women navigating this same landscape.

The cultural messaging directed at young women over the past several years has been consistent: men are immature, emotionally unavailable, and unreliable. Dating is exhausting. Marriage is a trap that historically benefited men at women’s expense. Better to invest in yourself, build your career, travel with your friends, and keep your options open. Go “boy sober.” Post the TikTok. Enjoy the Sunday brunch.

Baer and Wilcox name this cultural posture heteropessimism, and they take it seriously as a response to real frustrations. Young women have encountered real immaturity. Real disappointment. Real relational damage. The feelings behind heteropessimism are not invented.

But the data behind the cultural prescription is damning. Only 24% of women aged 18 to 29 believe married mothers are ultimately happier than other women. Yet unmarried, childless women in their 20s and 30s are nearly three times more likely to be unhappy compared to married mothers the same age. The cultural story young women are being told — that independence is the path to flourishing — is being contradicted by the lived experience of the women who followed it into their 30s and beyond.

Life coach Suzanne Venker describes the pattern she sees repeatedly in her work: women in their 30s arriving desperate, having spent their 20s building exactly the scaffolding of independence the culture prescribed — careers, savings, status — while letting family formation sit on the back burner. By the time they feel ready for the switch, the dating pool has shrunk, fertility has narrowed, and the habits of Amazonian detachment do not reverse themselves simply because a woman decides she is ready.

The tragedy, as Baer and Wilcox observe, is not that young women lack ambition for family life. Most of them have it. The tragedy is that the culture is talking them out of acting on it while there is still time.

What This Means for Your Church

Together these two IFS pieces point to a single underlying crisis: a generation of young adults on both sides of the dating equation who lack the real-life relational experiences, the human connection skills, and the community context that historically made the path from single to married feel natural and achievable.

Young men are losing those skills to screens. Young women are being told by the culture to distrust the very relationships those skills are meant to build. And the institution that is most capable of offering an alternative — a community where men develop relational maturity through real accountability and real friendship, where women encounter a compelling, data-backed vision of why marriage and family are worth pursuing, and where both encounter each other in the context of shared values and genuine community — is the local church.

This is not abstract. It is the specific, practical opportunity in front of every pastor and young adult ministry leader right now. The young adults in your congregation are navigating these exact pressures. The men absorbed in screens who have quietly withdrawn from the relational work that used to happen naturally. The women who have absorbed, often without fully realizing it, a cultural posture of skepticism toward men and marriage that is at odds with what they actually want. These are not people who need a lecture. They need a community that offers them something better — real friendship, real accountability, real vision, and the relational experiences that build the skills that commitment requires.

Communio can help your church build that ministry strategy. We have a toolbox of content and resources designed specifically to help churches engage and reach young adults — creating the kind of real-life relational experiences that algorithms and cultural cynicism cannot provide.

Take the Next Step

The dating recession is real. The cultural forces behind it are measurable. And the local church has both the opportunity and the responsibility to respond — not with a program, but with a community that forms young adults for the relationships they actually want.

► Read the IFS article on high-speed internet and marriage → ifstudies.org

► Read the IFS article on heteropessimism → ifstudies.org

► Learn how Communio can help your church reach young adults → communio.org/learnmore

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the connection between 4G internet adoption and declining marriage rates? A working paper by economists Nathan Hudson and Hernan Moscoso Boedo found that areas which adopted 4G mobile internet earlier saw measurably lower marriage rates among non-college-educated men. The mechanism was not that screen time replaced work — it replaced time with friends. Fewer friendships and less face-to-face social connection translated into fewer marriages, particularly for men who were already less likely to marry.

What is heteropessimism and why does it matter? Heteropessimism is a growing cultural posture among young women characterized by the conviction that men and marriage are more trouble than they’re worth, and that independence is a more reliable path to a fulfilling life. Brad Wilcox and Maria Baer at IFS argue that while the frustrations behind it are real, the prescription is harmful: unmarried, childless women in their 20s and 30s are nearly three times more likely to be unhappy compared to married mothers the same age. The cultural story is contradicted by the data.

Why are young men spending more time on screens than with friends? Survey data cited in the IFS research shows that nearly a quarter of young men now gamble daily, more than two in five watch pornography daily, and about the same share play video games daily. These habits are not replacing work — they are replacing the social leisure and friend time that previously provided the relational context for meeting potential partners and developing the relationship skills that marriage requires.

What can the church offer that the culture cannot? The local church is uniquely positioned to provide the real-life relational experiences and human connection skills that young adults are losing to screens and cultural cynicism. It offers community built around shared values, accountability structures that help men develop relational maturity, and a compelling, data-supported vision of why marriage and family are worth pursuing. Communio helps churches build the ministry strategy and programming to make that community accessible and effective for young adults.

How can Communio help my church reach young adults? Communio offers a toolbox of content, resources, and strategic coaching to help churches develop intentional young adult ministry that goes beyond Sunday morning programming. This includes community event models designed as non-threatening on-ramps, relationship skills content, and a data-informed ministry strategy tailored to the specific context of your congregation. To learn more, visit communio.org/learnmore.

Credit: This post draws on “Is High Speed Internet the Reason You’re Not Married?” by Robert VerBruggen, published by the Institute for Family Studies on August 19, 2026, and “The Amazonian Trap: How Heteropessimism Is Harming Young Women” by Maria Baer and Brad Wilcox, published by the Institute for Family Studies on July 21, 2026 (originally in the Deseret News). Read both articles at ifstudies.org.