"I'm going to college to get my 'M-r-s.' degree." There's a phrase you don't hear very often at the University of Wisconsin. At best, it sounds quaint, calling to mind images of women in an "I Love Lucy" era who might just have dropped out of college once Desi popped the question.

In the United States in 1955, the median age of first marriage for men was 22.6 years, and for women it was 20.2 years, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce and the Bureau of the Census. The median age of first marriage in the U.S. has gone up considerably since then, to 27 for men and 25 for women as of 2003.

Since 1980, women have outnumbered men at American colleges and universities, and you don't see most of them flipping through bridal catalogues just yet.

"Many college students seem acutely conscious that the years after graduation will be full of movement and unpredictability, as each person chooses between work, graduate school, and travel, all of which could take place anywhere in the world, and all of which requires almost absolute freedom and flexibility," wrote Norval Glenn and Elizabeth Marquardt in their 2001 report "Hooking Up, Hanging Out, and Hoping for Mr. Right: College Women on Dating and Mating Today."

The report also implied that many parents actually now discourage their daughters from marrying in their early twenties, expecting them first to support themselves. So in recent years the college environment has become one "in which preparation for one's future is the preeminent goal, one in which sexual norms are permissive, and one in which there is little encouragement for contemplating marriage in the foreseeable future," Glenn and Marquardt write.

But while most women no longer go to college expecting to find a husband, as many as 91 percent of the women surveyed in-depth agreed that marriage was an important lifetime goal.

According to the report, today's college relationships are characterized by either a complete lack of commitment or too much commitment too soon, with little wiggle room in between. Students are "altar-bound or messing around," Glenn and Marquardt claim. The report's investigators suggest that because fewer students are contemplating marriage in the near future, the concept of "courtship" has disappeared, and students are left fumbling for social cues about dating.

So what are college students looking for in the here and now? Some portray the current generation of students as hedonists looking only to "hook up," or engage in physical relations from kissing to sex without making a commitment. Journalist Tom Wolfe took this line in his 2004 novel "I Am Charlotte Simmons," in which he portrays collegiate life as centered around excessive drinking and rampant promiscuity. But this view of college students is too narrow.

College women in the 2001 report acknowledged that hooking up with no expectations was prevalent on campuses nationwide, and many of those who did hook up — 62 percent — admitted that it made them feel desirable, although a similar number — 64 percent — also said that hook-ups were awkward. (Summing up the ambiguities of hooking up, Sex and the City's Carrie Bradshaw remarks: "Are we simply romantically challenged, or are we sluts?") Most of the women who did hook up expressed the feeling that they were ultimately looking for something more meaningful, but were unsure of how to proceed.

Yet students reported that when couples did enter relationships in college, they became "joined at the hip," spending most of their nights together in addition to studying, doing laundry, hanging out at the dorms or at apartments, going out and eating together daily. Many complained that this type of relationship was stifling or worried that it would keep them from meeting a variety of people and "experimenting."

Very religious students surveyed formed a smaller group (18 percent of the national sample), many of whom expressed the desire to date exclusively without necessarily being sexually active.

Whatever happened to casual dating? Granted, many students may not be immediately concerned with marriage, and there is nothing wrong per se with hooking up, entering a serious relationship in college, or with abstaining from sex entirely. The decision is personal. It's a sign of progress if the famous double standard is waning and women enjoy the same degree of sexual freedom as men. Eighty-seven percent of women surveyed agreed with the statement: "I should not judge anyone's sexual conduct except my own."

But there's something really appealing about that old concept of dating, when going out to dinner did not automatically imply a serious commitment or intense physical relations, and dating several people at once was normal. If so many of today's college students apparently believe going on a date carries the expectation of an all-consuming relationship, no wonder they're running for the hills!

So we're not getting married yet … can we date?

Cynthia Martens ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in Italian and European Studies.