Let’s call this the most unsurprising headline of the year so far “Marriage Increases The Odds Of Surviving Cancer, Studies Find.” Next thing you know they’ll be discovering that salt makes you thirsty. I’m not actually belittling the science, more the opposite. Even the most cursory glance at social science data accumulated over the past, oh, 150 years, provides copious evidence that we humans do better pair-bonded for life. And if data doesn’t convince you, there’s also literature, anecdote, tradition, and intuition. But let’s stick with science for now.

Two studies published in the Journal Cancer found that among 800,000 adults diagnosed with cancer between 2000 and 2009, those who were married survived the disease at higher rates than single people — much higher rates. Especially men. The death rate among unmarried women was 19 percent higher than for married women, and for unmarried men the rate was 27 percent higher. The researchers controlled for factors like income, health insurance status, race, and other factors but still found that marriage was a key variable. Scarlett Lin Gomez of the Cancer Prevention Institute, one of the authors, told the Washington Post that money does not explain her results, but that “social support” is a “key factor.”

It’s interesting about the men, isn’t it? Marriage confers many benefits on women (though the early feminists were venomously anti-marriage), but study after study has found that when it comes to health and longevity, men benefit even more than women from tying the knot (and keeping it tied).