The charts below give information about USA marriage and divorce rates between 1970 and 2000, and the marital status of adult Americans in two of the years.
Sample Response
The first chart illustrates changes in the numbers of marriages and divorcesthe change in the number of marriages and divorces in the US over the 30-year period from 1970 to 2000over a 30-year period from 1970. The second chart compares the proportions of adult Americans in different marital-status categoriesthe proportion of American adults’ different marital statuses in 1970 and 2000in two years, 1970 and 2000.
Overall, there was a clear downward trend in the number of marriagesdownward trend of people getting married in the US. Although most adult Americansa majority of adult Americans were married in both years shownin both recorded years, there was a considerablyquite higher percentage of never-married adultspeople staying single in 2000.
From 1970 to 1980, 2.5 million marriages were registered in America; however, this number gradually decreased to 2 million by the year 2000. In contrast, the number of divorcesthe number of divorces filed was 1 million in 1970around 1 million in 1970 and then reached a peak at about 1.4 millionalmost 1.5 million in 1980a decade later. There had been since then fewer divorces and the figure fell back to 1 million in 2000, exactly half the number of marriagesexactly 50% of that of the marriages in the same year.
The proportionpercentage of married American adults dropped from 70% in 1970 to 60%around 60% in 2000. Similarly, there was a marginal decrease in the proportion of widowed people. The figures for never-married people and divorced ones experienced a slight rise, by around 8% for each category.
Why this response received Band 7.5
The response is strongest in its clear organisation and generally accurate selection of the main trends across both charts. Its main limitation is task coverage: the overview omits the rise-then-fall pattern in divorces, while the final claim that the never-married and divorced groups each rose by about eight percentage points overstates both changes. Prioritise exact cross-checking of figures and a more comprehensive overview.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The response presents a clear overview and reports most key figures accurately, but it omits the divorce fluctuation from the overview and overstates the increases in two marital-status groups.
Add the divorce peak and subsequent decline to the overview, and report the never-married and divorced increases as roughly five and six percentage points respectively.
Coherence and Cohesion
Information is logically sequenced into purposeful paragraphs, with clear progression from the broad trends to supporting figures.
Refine the chronological link around the post-1980 divorce trend so that the transition reads more naturally and directly.
Lexical Resource
The vocabulary is sufficiently varied and generally precise for describing trends and proportions, although a few phrases such as "a quite higher percentage" and "divorced ones" are awkward.
Use more natural statistical collocations such as "a considerably higher proportion" and "the proportion of divorced adults".
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A range of complex sentence forms is used with generally good control, though occasional errors in comparative phrasing, tense, and word order reduce precision.
Recast awkward structures such as "There had been since then fewer divorces" as direct, accurately sequenced clauses such as "Thereafter, the number of divorces declined".
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The charts below give information about USA marriage and divorce rates between 1970 and 2000, and the marital status of adult Americans in two of the years.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.