Definition: Marital status

Category: United Nations terminology

The personal status of each individual in relation to the marriage laws or customs of the country: single, in other words, never married; married; widowed and not remarried; divorced and not remarried; and married but separated. In some countries "married" takes into account customary unions (which are legal and binding under customary law) and extralegal unions, the latter often known as de facto (consensual) unions. http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cdb/cdb_list_dicts.asp