By John Crouch, J.D., with Monika Scoville, J.D., L.L.M., Richard Beaulieu, Ashley Sharpe, Kristen Thrine, Scott Dukat and Sarah Williams.

• Wait periods range 0 to 2 years in U.S., 0 to 6 years in Europe.
  
  
• All 8 nations with divorce under 0.2% have:
  -mandatory counseling or
  -3+ - year waiting periods.
  
  
  
• Of the 13 nations with 0.2 to 0.3% divorce:
  -5 have 3+-year wait periods,
  -3 have 1- or 2-year wait periods,
  -1 has mandatory counseling,
  -5 have weaker counseling laws.
  
  
• Waiting periods in the U.S.:
  -0 highest-divorce states: 9 w/ no wait.
  -10 lowest-divorce states: 5 w/ waits.
  
  
• States with any waiting period tend to have slightly lower divorce.
  
  
• Wait length is significant only with longest waits (with larger incentives for mutual consent). 2-year wait states have much less divorce than U.S. average.

• Generally, divorce is rarer and less readily available in Europe than in the U.S.
• Longer waiting periods and mandatory counseling both correlate strongly, but not perfectly, with lower divorce rates.
• Optional court-ordered counseling during a divorce does not correlate with lower divorce rates.
• Reconciliation counseling laws in U.S. are optional and are almost never used.
• In the U.S., enforced laws correlate with lower divorce; unenforced laws do not. This suggests laws have some causative role, are not merely results of the same cultural conditions that cause lower divorce.
• Other important factors are probably geography, religion, age of population, marriage rate, social rootedness vs. mobility, modernity.

• European divorce rates are annual per capita for 1999, except Italy's is for 2000.
• U.S. divorce rates and ranks are annual per capita for 2001, latest available.
• States marked "unknown" do not collect information or statistics on divorces.
• Wait periods are effective minimum time required before no-fault divorce is final. May be before or after filing.
• Counseling laws are those that impose or encourage marriage-saving counseling in the divorce process; NOT mediation or education on other issues, and not premarital counseling.
• Louisiana, Arizona, and Arkansas have seldom-used Covenant Marriage laws letting couples choose longer waiting period, mandatory counseling. Not shown on chart.
• Czech Republic and Germany have rarely-used laws letting judge refuse a divorce that would cause hardship to spouse or children. Not shown on chart.