The number of single Seoul residents aged 25 to 49 surged seven-fold over the past 40 years, with nearly four in 10 staying unmarried last year, data showed Monday.

According to statistics compiled by the Seoul city government, 1.58 million people, or 37.9 percent, of that age group residing in Seoul were unmarried in 2010, up from 215,100 in 1970 when 11.9 percent of the residents were unmarried.

The surge in the single population is in line with the country's overall trend of marrying later in life or avoiding it altogether, as some 40 percent of the total population among the age group were unmarried last year, up from 12 percent in 1970, the data showed. 

The marital age last year stood at 32.2 and 29.8 for male and female citizens, respectively, up around 4 years each from two decades earlier, according to the data.

While the total number of one-member households in Seoul stood at 838,114 last year, up from 82,477 in 1980, the unmarried population accounted for 60.1 percent of the city's total single households, followed by widows and widowers with 17.4 percent and divorcees with 12.6 percent, the data showed.

Among the 335,849 divorcees in Seoul last year, 27.3 percent opted for getting divorced after at least 20 years of marriage, up from 6.6 percent in 1990, the data showed. Those who maintained their marriage less than four years before breaking up comprised 25 percent, down from 38.3 percent two decades ago, it added.

"The overall heightening of the women's status in the society is likely attributable to changes in the perception of marriage, which led to the increase in the single population as well as in the elderly couples who chose to divorce," a city official said. (Yonhap News)