A time to join, a time to quit: The influence of life cycle transitions on voluntary association membership

Abstract

Voluntary association researchers typically rely on cross-sectional data to demonstrate that individual membership varies across life cycle stages. The life cycle and membership, however, are more appropriately treated as dynamic processes. This research recognizes the dynamic nature of these processes by exploring the influence of transitions to marriage and parenthood on the joining and leaving rates of voluntary associations. Event history techniques are used to analyze retrospective data from a probability sample of 1,050 individuals. Separate models are estimated for males and females, while additional analyses disaggregate joining and leaving rates by group type. Results demonstrate that the effects of life cycle transitions on rates are gendered and suggest that relationships consistently reported in cross-sectional analyses result from differences in underlying joining and leaving rates.