Wzory doboru małżeńskiego w Polsce i przyczyny ich powstawania

The article aims to discuss spouse selection patterns, such as homogamy and hypergamy, that can be observed among Polish couples. It is shown how these patterns have evolved in the last decades, from 1975 to 2008. Attempt has been made to explain, why these marriage patterns emerge and what this can tell us about the society. As status homogamy entails mating within one’s own status or social group, it is considered to be an indicator of openness of status groups and of social stratification. The paper touches upon the rigidity of social structure in Poland that was assessed by the analysis of marriage patterns. The study focuses on socioeconomic characteristics of potential partners, i.e. social origin (parental status), education level and occupational status. The results suggest that Poles show some preference of partner’s achieved status, which includes education level and occupation, whereas social origin does not seems to be relevant for spouse selection. However, the strength of homogamy seems to have declined over the past thirty years. The results of analysis do not support the existence of educational hypergamy in Poland and fail to give a clear answer in case of occupational status, which is rather uncommon on a global scale. Calculations were based on loglinear models and correspondence analysis