In this paper we propose a particular marriage model, i.e., a model for the number of marriages for each age combination as a function of the vectors of the number of single men and women in each age group. The model is based on Dagsvik (2000) where it is demonstrated that a general type of matching behavior imply, under specific assumptions about the distribution of the preferences of the women and men, a convenient expression for the corresponding marriage model. Data from the Norwegian Population Register for nine years are applied to estimate the model. We subsequently test the hypothesis that, apart from a random “noise”; component, the age‐specific parameters of the model change over time according to a common trend. We find that the hypothesis is not rejected by our data.

This is an electronic version of an article published in Mathematical Population Studies, Vol. 9 (2), March 2001, 97-121. Mathematical Population Studies is available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/gmps20/9/2