The mission of the Institute for Family Studies (IFS) is to strengthen marriage and family life and advance the welfare of children through research and public education. Known for its objective and impeccably researched studies that attract attention and respect from across the ideological spectrum, IFS’s programs and platforms focus on the following issues: 

• The connection between strong marriages and a thriving economy;
• The retreat from marriage among working-class Americans;
• The state of dating and courtship in America;
• The negative impact of broken families on child welfare and development;
• Parenting, child care trends, and achieving a healthy work-family balance;
• The rise of cohabitation and its consequences for children and communities;
• The positive influence that fathers play in their children’s lives;
• The real facts and answers about divorce in America;
• The connection between healthy families and high educational attainment;
• The role of technology in family life;
• How pop culture and pornography affects marriage and family in America.

The fact that roughly one in two children in America grow up outside of an intact, married family constitutes one of the most significant threats to America’s future stability and prosperity. By carefully and accurately documenting the causes and consequences of family instability, IFS seeks to elevate this growing phenomenon to the top of the nation’s policy and cultural agenda where it can receive the recognition and response it deserves. Strong families make strong societies; fragile families make for fragile societies. It is this insight that informs the work of IFS, and we encourage you to utilize this website to become more aware of what can be done to strengthen marriage and family life in America.

Praise for IFS

“IFS scholars and writers have brought a welcome rigor to arguments that often generate more heat than light, and grounded the case for strong families in hard facts as well as first principles. Winsome, Witty, and Engaged with America as it actually exists, they’re doing their part to transform the culture wars we have into the debates that we desperately need.”

~ Ross Douthat, Columnist, New York Times

“Threats to marriage and the family are the most pressing issues of our time. We should be very grateful that we have the newly founded Institute for Family Studies to address those threats with moral clarity and sound social science.”

~ R.R. Reno, Editor, First Things

“IFS was formed with a rich grasp of the sociological and historical importance of families in rearing the next generation, stabilizing society, and generating wealth. And they are alert to the paradoxes of our own culture, one deeply invested in expressive individualism yet naïve about the structures that allow it to flourish.”

~ Kay Hymowitz, Author, Manning Up: How the Rise of Women Has Turned Men into Boys
 

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