The 2011 Census has shown that the population in England and Wales has become more ethnically diverse and all minority groups1 (with the exception of White Irish) have increased in number since 2001. In 2011, 1.2 million people (2% of the population) identified themselves with a mixed or multiple ethnicity, increasing from 660,000 (1%) in 2001. These Mixed/Multiple ethnic groups have the youngest age profile of all the ethnic groups. For example, 45% of the Mixed/Multiple ethnic groups were aged under 16, compared with 19% of the overall population.

These earlier ethnicity statistics from the 2011 Census focused on the individual. To provide a wider picture of ethnic diversity we can look at mixed ethnicities within the household. This article therefore examines inter-ethnic relationships of all people who are in a couple. Inter-ethnic relationships are defined here as a relationship between people living in a couple who are married, in a civil partnership, or cohabiting and each partner identifies with an ethnic group different from the other partner (within any of the 18 ethnic group classifications used in the census). For example, if someone who identified as Black Caribbean and someone who identified as White British were in a relationship then that would be an inter-ethnic relationship. An inter-ethnic relationship can also be between groups within the broad ethnic group categories, such as someone who was a Gypsy or Irish Traveller and someone who was White British.

Exploring inter-ethnic relationships provides further insight into the patterns and trends of an increasingly ethnically diverse population and how ethnic identities are changing over time.

The analysis explores some of the different factors which may affect the number of inter-ethnic relationships including ethnic group, gender, age, type of relationship and dependent children. There are likely to be other factors that affect inter-ethnic relationships (such as religion, geographical concentration, country of birth and length of time in the country) which are not fully considered in detail in this article and would require further analysis.