A study being conducted by the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) will help address and improve marriage outcomes in the American Muslim community. 

The study is examining different models of marriage education and divorce prevention programs and will document the effectiveness of these models. 

Findings from the study will provide American Muslims with more information and research on divorce in addition to making the alternatives for seeking help with marital conflict more broad. 

The ISPU Divorce Prevention Study 2013 is expected to be completed by the end of this year and will cost $120,000. Researchers for the project are currently conducting individual interviews and holding focus groups with Muslim religious leaders, community leaders, mental health providers and counselors, as well as with people who are divorced and married, to determine the use and feasibility of marriage education in the American Muslim community. The ISPU’s study has encouraged individuals and groups to speak openly and frankly about marital conflict.

Michigan is a significant part of the study, because of the large population of American Muslims residing in metro Detroit. The region has one of the highest concentrations of Muslim Americans in the United States. Some members of the study’s research team are also from Michigan, including Amal Killawai, who is a clinical social worker and researcher at the University of Michigan and the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACCESS), and Zain Shamoon, who is a PhD student in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Michigan State University. 

The ISPU will also examine the various types of models that other communities use to assist couples during troubling times. 

Currently, limited research, and very little resources and information are available to practitioners, religious leaders and members of the community to offer support to couples who may be going through a difficult time in their marriage.  

Over the years, Muslim community leaders from across the United States have expressed concern over marital discord and rising divorce rates in the community. 

ISPU Executive Director, Shireen Zaman says that concerns about the rise of divorce rates within the American Muslim community was brought to the organization’s attention on several occasions prior to the study being launched.

According to ISPU fellow, Julie Macfarlane, divorce rates among North American Muslims has risen sharply in the last 25 years. For the older generations, divorce was considered unusual, or even unheard of in their families. Even when marriages did end, the widespread social taboo associated with divorce made it difficult to discuss openly with family and members of the community. 

On April 20, the ISPU hosted its annual Spring dinner at the Muslim Unity Center in Bloomfield Hills, where the project was discussed in depth. Macfarlane, the author of “Islamic Divorce in North America: A Shari’a Path in a Secular Society,” which is a compilation of more than 100 interviews with divorced men and women in the community, was one of the event’s speakers.   

She discussed some of the data that was compiled through a study on divorce in the Muslim community. One common trend that she found among people was that many said they didn’t know where to go, or who to turn to, when they experienced trouble in their marriage.  

“Many, many people said they didn’t know where to go. One thing that is clear is most of the people who sought help, sought it too late for it to really be effective in enabling them to put their marriages back together,” she said.  

Macfarlane during the ISPU event.

Having conducted studies on divorce in other communities, McFarlane said the issue, in general, really isn’t that different among non-muslims. 

“The reason that people struggle in their marital relationships in the Muslim community are the same reasons that non-Muslims, and people of other faiths, struggle with inside their marriages. There is an enormous similarity between the data that I’ve collected here and in other communities too,” she said.  

However, one difference that she found in the data that she collected within the Muslim community was that, by far, the most common cause of conflict between a husband and a wife is changes in gender roles. Young women in the Muslim community who are wives today are leading a very different life than the lives of their mothers and their grandmothers.  They are far more educated and have expectations about becoming professionals, andwant to be part of the community in a very active way, while taking care of their home and children. 

“There is a real shift that we are seeing throughout society and, to be perfectly frank with you, some of the husbands I talked to had dealt better with that shift than others had, and some were really struggling,” MacFarlane said. 

She found that one in four of the people that she interviewed, who had divorced, sited domestic violence as an issue and a factor in the breakdown of their marriage.  “That figure I realize is shockingly high, but I would add immediately that it is no higher than it is in any other community,” she said. 

The ISPU is an independent, nonpartisan think tank and research organization, committed to conducting objective, empirical research and offering expert policy analysis on some of the most pressing issues facing the nation. It has conducted other studies focused on issues in the community, including alcohol use among young Muslims. Some of its other significant studies have been about issues including U.S. foreign policy, national security, the economy and public health. Additionally, the ISPU has built a solid reputation as a trusted source for information about American Muslims and Muslim communities around the world.

Learn how you can support the ISPU’s marriage and divorce project: To make a donation to help fund the project visit, www.ispu.org. You can also find out how to host an event to discuss the topic among members in your community on the site, which also features some  available research on the study.