Only a quarter of couples who move in together in the UK actively see it as a step towards getting married, .jpg)
according to a new study.
And a fifth of such couples have actively ruled marriage out.
According to polling by the Co-operative Legal Services, a British legal firm, one in seven of cohabiting couples, or couples planning to cohabit, are convinced they will never be able to afford to get married even if they wanted to, the Daily Telegraph reports.
The study also uncovered growing confusion among the public about what rights people who live together unmarried have to property and contact with their children in the event of a break-up.
It found that almost a third of people wrongly believe that couples who live together have the same financial rights as married couples because of a widespread belief in the notion of “common law” marriage.
In a similar survey a year ago only a fifth of the population believed this, suggesting that the confusion is growing rather than diminishing.
The recent upturn in the property market is expected to lead to a rise in the number of couples making the decision to move in together.
British figures published last year have shown that cohabitation is becoming the norm, even for couples planning to start a family, with almost equal numbers of babies born in and outside of marriage.
Cohabitation is far less stable than marriage. According to the British Millennium Cohort Study, only 10pc of married couples will have broken up by the time their child is five, compared with 25pc of cohabiting couples.
Only 35pc of British children born into a cohabiting union will live with both parents throughout their childhood, compared with 70pc born to married couples.
According to the only piece of Irish research on cohabitation, only one in four cohabiting relationships in Ireland last seven years or more. The rest end in marriage or breakup.
Couples who cohabit before marriage are more likely to divorce than those who do not cohabit first.
But the polling goes further, suggesting that marriage itself is now an active consideration only for a only a minority.
Those who said that they either were cohabiting or would consider it were asked what their main motivation for doing so was.
Almost four out of 10 said it was purely to “live together as a couple”, while one in five said it was to reduce living costs and another fifth said they had no desire ever to marry.
Just 24 per cent said that they saw it as a stepping stone or trial run to marriage, to “test the strength” of the relationship.
Harry Benson of the Marriage Foundation, the think-tank set up by the High Court judge Sir Paul Coleridge, said: “The important question is whether couples are sliding into living together or making a decision about their future.
“The problem with cohabitation is that it can trap in less than ideal relationships.”
He added that actively setting out to “test” a relationship could be a sign of insecurity rather than strength.
“Couples who want to make their relationship work have got to make decisions about their future together, that’s the key and marriage is the most obvious way to do that,” he said.
“If you are explicitly saying that you are there to test your relationship, that almost certainly means that it is not going to work and you are really doing it for convenience or fun.”