Cohabitation
A dashed line joining two partners, where a marriage line would be, means a couple who live together without being married.
Easily confused with
- MarriageA marriage is a line down from each partner and across beneath them, joining the two. The year of the marriage is written on the line, as in m 1970.
- Distant relationshipA dashed line beneath two partners, or a dotted line straight between two people.
- AdoptionBoth dashed: across beneath a couple, or down to a child.
How to read it
On the Multicultural Family Institute’s sheet the line beneath an unmarried couple is dashed where a Marriage line is solid, and its dates are written as LT ’95 (LT for living together) or Rel 95, LT 97 for a relationship that began in 1995 and became living together in 1997. Washburn University’s guide calls the same dotted horizontal line a common-law relationship.
Also searched as: cohabitation symbol, genogram cohabitation, living together genogram.
This explains what a symbol records on a genogram. Clinicians vary the notation, and a genogram’s own key takes precedence.
Look-alikes
Three other dotted or dashed lines appear on genograms. A dotted line drawn straight between two people records a Distant relationship relationship. A dashed line down to a child marks Adoption. A dotted line drawn all the way round a group of people marks a household: the University of North Dakota’s guide uses it for who lives together, and the 2021 Research in Practice guide draws cohabitants this way, with a line round the couple and their child.
Read next
- Next in Genogram symbolsSeparationOne slash across a marriage line means the couple have separated. The date is written beside it, as in s ’95.
- The same shape in African flagsFlag of EthiopiaEthiopia’s flag is green, yellow and red in equal horizontal stripes with a blue disc in the centre holding a yellow star of equal lines with yellow rays. Ethiopia’s Flag Proclamation makes the green labour, fertility and development, the yellow hope, justice and equality, and the red sacrifice and heroism for freedom and equality; the blue disc is peace and the star the unity of Ethiopia’s nations, nationalities and peoples.
More genogram symbols
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols drawn with circles, lines or squares and rectangles.
Sources
- GenoGrams, Jay Memmott, Department of Social Work, Washburn University, Basic Symbols, slide 9
- Standard Symbols for Genograms, The Multicultural Family Institute (copy on a PBworks course wiki), Page 1
- QA Case Review: Genogram Resource, ND CFS Quality Assurance, revised November 2022, Children and Family Services Training Center, University of North Dakota, Step 2
- Using genograms in practice, Practice Tool, Hannah Scott, February 2021, Research in Practice (The Dartington Hall Trust), Figure 3, page 13
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research
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