This annual report presents demographic data on households and families for 1983 and highlights some important changes that have occurred in recent years. Nine pages of text precede the 25 detailed tables that compose the major portion of the report. This preliminary text provides an introduction and a user's guide to the tabular material. Briefly described are composition of households, change in household formation patterns, selected characteristics of households, one-parent families, years of school completed by family householders, homeownership, and related reports. Selected highlights of these discussions include the observations that (1) the number of households in 1983 (about 83.9 million) did not increase significantly over the number of households in 1982; (2) average household size dropped from 3.33 persons per household in 1964 to 2.73 persons per household in 1981, but no significant change in the average has occurred during the past 2 years; (3) one-parent families, as a percentage of all families with children, increased from 11 percent in 1970 to 22 percent in 1983; and (4) among all families with children, the proportion of householders completing 4 or more years of college in 1983 was 22 percent, as compared with 9 percent for female householders maintaining one-parent homes. Two appendices provide (1) term definitions and explanations of categories, and (2) information concerning source and reliability of estimates. (RH)