Perceiving unfairness in the family: cause or consequence of marital distress?

This research tests a model suggesting that marital distress leads individuals to scrutinize what is given and received in the relationship. This scrutiny elicits perceptions of unfairness that maintain or exacerbate marital distress. In a 3-panel longitudinal study tracking married couples across the transition to parenthood, both wives' and husbands' reports of marital conflict and wives' marital dissatisfaction at Time 1 positively predicted perceived unfairness of the allocation of household tasks at Time 2, controlling for earlier perceptions of unfairness. In addition, there was evidence of perceived unfairness of division of labor at Time 2 predicting marital conflict and marital dissatisfaction for wives at Time 3, controlling for earlier conflict and dissatisfaction. This model of relationship distress and perceptions of unfairness is contrasted with prior interpretations of links between perceived injustice and distress in relationships.     

LINKAGES BETWEEN WOMEN'S PROVIDER-ROLE ATTITUDES, PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING, AND FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

The primary aim of this investigation was to examine the extent to which the meanings women attach to their provider-role responsibilities are differentially related to their psychological well-being and family relationships and to the division of labor in the home. The sample included 43 dualearner and 50 single-earner families. In home interviews, wives reported on role overload, depression, satisfaction with the marriage, and attitudes regarding women's and men's roles. Their children completed two measures assessing daily hassles and their relationship with their mother. Reports of daily involvement in household work were obtained from wives and husbands during four telephone interviews. Discriminant function analyses indicated that aspects of women's psychological well-being and marital and parent-child relationships and of the division of labor discriminated women in four different provider groups: maidsecondary providers, ambivalent coproviders, coproviders, and homemakers. Wives who were ambivalent about their provider responsibilities tended to report higher levels of depression and overload and significantly lower marital satisfaction. Wives who saw their employment as secondary to that of their husbands reported relatively higher levels of depression and overload but also the highest levels of marital satisfaction.     

Marital satisfaction across the transition to parenthood.

The purpose of the present study was to discriminate between the 2 dominant perspectives governing research on the nature of marital change over the transition to parenthood. Progress can be made in understanding this transition by recognizing the role of uncontrolled sources of variability in research designs, defining and using control groups, and timing of data collection around the child's arrival, and the authors conducted a study incorporating these methodological refinements. Growth curve analyses were conducted on marital satisfaction data collected twice before and twice after the birth of the 1st child and at corresponding points for voluntarily childless couples (N = 156 couples). Spouses who were more satisfied prior to pregnancy had children relatively early in marriage, and parents experienced greater declines in marital satisfaction compared to nonparents. Couples with planned pregnancies had higher prepregnancy satisfaction scores, and planning slowed husbands' (but not wives') postpartum declines. In sum, parenthood hastens marital decline--even among relatively satisfied couples who select themselves into this transition--but planning status and prepregnancy marital satisfaction generally protect marriages from these declines.     

Children,traditionalism in the division of family work,and marital satisfaction: “What's love got to do with it?”

This research examines several of the factors related to the frequently cited finding that the presence of children in the home is related to lower marital satisfaction. Structural equation modeling was used to test whether the number of children at home and the length of marriage predicted traditionalism in the division of family work, which, in turn, was differentially associated with erotic, ludic, friendship-based, and agapic love as well as marital satisfaction for 530 married men and women. For both men and women, the greater the number of children at home and the longer the marriage, the more traditional the division of family labor. Traditionalism predicted lower levels of erotic and friendship-based love for women, which ultimately were related to lower marital satisfaction. For men, however, traditionalism was associated with stronger erotic and friendship-based love, a phenomenon linked to higher marital satisfaction. These findings clarify the connection between the number of children at home and reduced marital satisfaction for the women in the sample and suggest that, for both men and women, it is how family work is divided, rather than the presence of children per se, that has meaning for the affective quality of the marriage.     

The Big Five and enduring marriages

The present investigation tested the relations between the Big Five dimensions of personality and the marital relationships of over 400 couples using both observational and questionnaire data. Four major findings emerged from these analyses. First, self-reports of neuroticism were positively correlated with negative interactions and negatively correlated with global evaluations of the marriage. Second, self-reports of agreeableness were negatively correlated with negative interactions and generally positively correlated with global evaluations of the marriage. Third, self-reports of openness were negatively correlated with observer reports of negative interactions. Fourth, self-reports of openness by wives were positively correlated with global reports of sexual satisfaction. These findings suggest that agreeableness and openness deserve increased attention as significant correlates of close relationships. Discussion emphasizes the importance of intrapersonal factors for understanding marital relationships.     

A longitudinal investigation of stress spillover in marriage: does spousal support adequacy buffer the effects?

Stress spillover in marriage was examined within a stress-buffering conceptual framework in a multiwave, longitudinal sample of newlywed husbands and wives (N = 101 couples). Spousal support, chronic role strain, and marital satisfaction were assessed 4 times over 3 years and analyzed via actor-partner interdependence model and growth curve analytic techniques. Greater escalation in husbands' role strain over the first 3 years of marriage was associated with steeper declines in their marital satisfaction regardless of the adequacy of spousal support provided by their wives. In contrast, greater escalation in husbands' and wives' role strain was associated with significantly less marital decline for wives, and these links were bolstered when husbands provided wives with more adequate support. The present study is one of the first to explicate the underlying processes through which role strain and spousal support facilitate and mitigate the developmental course of marital satisfaction.     

The Role of Couple Discrepancies in Cognitive and Behavioral Egalitarianism in Marital Quality

Although gender ideologies and perceptions of equity in the division of household tasks have been associated with marital quality, there is limited understanding of the relationship between discrepancies (in husbands’ and wives’ subjective ideals and accounts of the division of labor) and relationship quality. We examined cognitive egalitarianism (beliefs about gender roles), behavioral egalitarianism (perceptions of the division of household tasks and management), and marital quality among 220 heterosexual, newlywed couples (N?=?440) living in east and central regions of the United States. We used multi-level modeling to examine associations between cognitive egalitarianism, behavioral egalitarianism, and marital quality with a specific focus on discrepancies in the reports of husbands and wives. As hypothesized, both husbands and wives had lower marital quality when their cognitive egalitarianism was discrepant from their partner, and such a discrepancy had a greater influence on wives’ reports of marital quality, especially for wives with higher cognitive egalitarianism. Although we expected similar results for the associations between behavioral egalitarianism and marital quality, we found that the strength of the association between wives’ behavioral egalitarianism and marital quality decreased as the discrepancy from their husbands’ behavioral egalitarianism increased. The association between cognitive egalitarianism and marital quality also increased as behavioral egalitarianism increased for wives but not for husbands. The results of this study illustrate the central role of spousal discrepancy in perceptions and enactment of household labor.     

Marital interaction in alcoholic and nonalcoholic couples: alcoholic subtype variations and wives' alcoholism status

The authors examined problem-solving marital interactions of alcoholic and nonalcoholic couples (N = 132). Four alcoholic groups (husband alcoholic with antisocial personality disorder or not, paired with alcoholic or nonalcoholic wives) were compared with each other and with a both-spouses-nonalcoholic group. Consistent with the alcoholic subtypes hypothesis, couples with an antisocial alcoholic husband had higher levels of hostile behavior regardless of wives' alcoholism status. In contrast, rates of positive behaviors and the ratio of positive to negative behaviors were greatest among couples in which either both or neither of the spouses had alcoholic diagnoses and were lowest among alcoholic husbands with nonalcoholic wives. Discussion focuses on possible mechanisms linking antisocial alcoholism and discrepant alcoholic diagnoses to poorer marital outcomes.     

家庭支持型主管行为与双职工夫妻的婚姻满意感:一个积极溢出-交叉模型

为了揭示家庭支持型主管行为(FSSB)对双职工夫妻双方婚姻满意感的影响及作用机制,本研究结合资源-获取-发展观和基于关系支持的积极发展模型,从夫妻互动(相互支持)的角度构建了一个积极溢出-交叉模型。运用结构方程模型对370对双职工夫妻配对数据进行分析,结果表明:(1)FSSB与我国双职工夫妻双方的婚姻满意感均正相关;(2)FSSB可通过增加员工的工作-家庭增益促进员工夫妻间相互支持的互惠效应,进而提升员工夫妻双方的婚姻满意感;(3)夫妻双方所获得的FSSB均可通过促进丈夫的婚姻满意感进而提升妻子的婚姻满意感。本研究提示,增加FSSB能有效促进双职工夫妻间的相互支持、提升夫妻双方的婚姻满意感。     

Socioemotional behavior and satisfaction in marital relationships: a longitudinal study.

The interplay between 3 types of socioemotional behavior (affection, sexual interest, and negativity) and marital satisfaction was studied using data from newly married couples followed over 2 years. Affection and negativity (but not sexual interest) were consistently associated cross-sectionally with marital satisfaction. Longitudinal analyses revealed a gender-differentiated pattern suggesting a more complex relationship between satisfaction and marital behavior than previously shown. Negativity, regardless of whether it was expressed by the husband or the wife, was associated with declines in wives' (but not husbands') satisfaction. Wives of husbands who were relatively negative early in marriage became more negative themselves. Wives who were relatively less satisfied early in marriage (but not husbands) were married to spouses who became more negative with time.     

The relationships of career salience,attitudes toward women,and demographic and family characteristics to marital adjustment in dual-career couples

Facilitation of women's increasing involvement and satisfaction in career pursuits necessitates understanding of ways in which multiple roles may be managed and integrated by both women and men. Accordingly, the present study was designed to investigate predictors of levels of marital adjustment in dual-career couples. Both husbands and wives in 42 dual-career couples completed Greenhaus' Career Salience scale, the Attitudes toward Women scale, the Dyadic Adjustment scale, and a demographic information questionnaire. Results indicated, first, that the dual-career couples studied reported relatively high levels of marital adjustment, relatively profeminist attitudes toward women, and moderate levels of career salience; family interests were ranked as more important than were career interests. Second, higher levels of marital adjustment in both husbands and wives were found in couples in which the wife was more highly educated and which had relatively high combined incomes. In addition, greater marital adjustment in husbands was related to higher levels of career salience among wives. Contrary to expectation, husbands' attitudes toward women's roles were unrelated to their levels of marital adjustment. Implications for further research on dual-career couples and for the successful integration of career and family roles are discussed.     

The Personality of Young Adult Couples and Wives'' Work Patterns

The influence of personality in 63 couples at the time of family formation on wives' work patterns 15 years later was examined in variable-centered and person/couple-centered ways. Four factor dimensions on the Adjective Check List assessed personality. Work patterns were assessed with measures of type, amount, and status of work and with schematic work narratives describing characters and plots abstracted from wives' mid-life data. Hierarchical regression analyses showed individuality of husbands to affect work outcomes after wives' college-age goals, their young adult personality, and the duration of marriages were taken into account. Conjoint high-low patterns of individuality in 34 couples were associated with different schematic work stories. These stories show distinctive personality and relational correlates at age 27. They flesh out and qualify hypotheses that individualistic partners would be open to women's careers and would show revealing strategies of combining self- and other interests in the transition to parenthood.     

Husbands' and wives' alcohol use disorders and marital interactions as longitudinal predictors of marital adjustment

In this longitudinal study, the relationships among wives' and husbands' lifetime alcoholism status, marital behaviors, and marital adjustment were tested. Participants were 105 couples from the Michigan Longitudinal Study (MLS), an ongoing multimethod investigation of substance use in a community-based sample of alcoholics, nonalcoholics, and their families. At baseline (T1), husbands and wives completed a series of diagnostic measures, and lifetime diagnosis of alcohol use disorder (AUD, as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th ed.), was assessed. Couples completed a problem-solving marital interaction task 3 years later at T2, which was coded for the ratio of positive to negative behaviors. Couples also completed a measure of marital adjustment at T4 (9 years after T1 and 6 years after T2). Results showed that husbands' lifetime AUD predicted lower levels of their wife's positive marital behaviors 3 years later but was not related to their own or their wife's marital adjustment 9 years from baseline. By contrast, wives' lifetime AUD had direct negative associations with their own and their husband's marital satisfaction 9 years later, and wives' marital behaviors during the problem-solving task predicted their own and their husband's marital satisfaction 6 years later. Findings indicate that marital adjustment in alcoholic couples may be driven more by the wives' than the husbands' AUD and marital behavior. Implications for intervention with alcoholic couples were discussed.     

Changes in attachment orientations across the transition to parenthood

According to attachment theory, individuals should experience changes in attachment orientations (styles) if they encounter experiences or events that strongly reinforce or directly contradict the major concerns of their existing orientations. Systematic changes should be most evident across stressful life transitions. Wives and husbands expecting their first child completed scales measuring their attachment orientations along with perceptions of themselves, their spouses, and their marriage both 6 weeks before and 6 months after childbirth. As predicted, women became more ambivalent across the transition if they entered parenthood perceiving less spousal support and more spousal anger, with perceptions of anger having stronger impact. Women who entered parenthood seeking less spousal support and those whose husbands were higher in avoidance became more avoidant across the transition. Men who perceived themselves as providing more prenatal support to their wives became less avoidant. These results extend attachment theory and research in novel directions.     

Marital Quality of Newlywed African American Couples: Implications of Egalitarian Gender Role Dynamics

This research examined associations between husbands’ and wives’ gender role attitudes, division of household labor, and marital quality in a sample of 697 newlywed African American couples residing in the southern region of the United States. Guided by a cultural ecological framework, we tested hypotheses specific to the unique socio-cultural context of African Americans using a mixed model ANCOVA design. Results revealed that: (1) couples reported lower marital quality when husbands had relatively more traditional gender role attitudes; (2) husbands reported lower marital quality when the couple engaged in a relatively more traditional division of household labor; and (3) husbands with more traditional attitudes who also engaged in a traditional division of labor reported lower marital quality compared to all other husbands. Although African Americans are thought to have more flexible gender role orientations than other racial/ethnic groups within the U.S., these results document within group variability in couple gender dynamics and its association with variability in marital quality.     

Husbands' and Wives' Attachment Orientations and Depressive Symptoms: Predictors of Positive and Negative Conflict Behaviors in the Marriage

The present study examined both husbands' and wives' attachment orientations and depressive symptoms in predicting reports of marital conflict behaviors. Married couples (N = 60) completed questionnaires to assess their attachment orientations, depressive symptoms, and perceptions of positive and negative conflict behaviors in the marital relationship. Using hierarchical regression analyses, statistical models were tested wherein husbands' and wives' reports of marital conflict behaviors were regressed on their own and their spouses' attachment orientations and depressive symptoms. The results suggest that both attachment orientations and depressive symptoms were important predictors of reported marital conflict behaviors. However, different predictors were found for husbands' and wives' reports of positive and negative conflict behaviors. In general, spouses' attributes played only a small role in predicting reports of marital conflict behaviors.     

Who's Got the Power? Gender Differences in Partners’ Perceptions of Influence During Marital Problem-Solving Discussions

Previous research on marital communication indicates that women have more influence in marital problem solving because they raise the issues and shape the discussion. Other studies suggest that men have the power in marital problem solving. This study re-examines power and influence from the partners’ point of view. Twenty-seven couples — 18 with a first child under 2, and 9 undecided about having children — were videotaped while working on a self-selected problem concerning their division of family labor. Data sources included: (a) transcribed audiotaped accounts given by each partner while viewing a videotape of their problem-solving discussion; (b) self-report questionnaires; and (c) ratings by a research team of the concordance between spouses’ accounts. Husbands and wives were perceived as having a primary influence on different aspects of the discussion. Women tended to raise the issues and draw men out in the early phase of the discussion, while men controlled the content and emotional depth of the later discussion phases, and largely determined the outcome. The women's accounts emphasized that their influence in the early phase was often illusory: their behavior was shaped primarily by the effort to choose strategies that would avoid upsetting their husbands. In terms of overall satisfaction with marriage, wives had greater tolerance than their husbands for conflict in the area of division of domestic labor, but less tolerance for their husbands’ domination of the discussion process. Women's marital satisfaction was higher when there was concordance between spouses in their accounts of their problem-solving discussion. This research highlights the importance of eliciting spouses’ own perceptions and definitions in understanding the impact of gender-linked power differences in marital communication.     

Topics of Marital Conflict in the Everyday Lives of Empty Nest Couples and Their Implications for Conflict Resolution

To improve our understanding of marriage experiences during midlife, diary reports of naturalistic marital conflict were collected from 55 couples who were parents of grown children who had left the home. Communication, chores, and habits were the most frequent sources of disagreements reported by husbands and wives. Hierarchical linear models tested the unique associations between multiple conflict topics and interaction characteristics (length, recurrence, initiator, and importance) and constructive, angry, and depressive resolution strategies. Husbands and wives similarly rated money and habits as recurrent topics and conflicts concerning money and children as holding relatively high levels of current and long-term importance to the relationship. Compared with other topics, husbands and wives consistently perceived conflicts concerning habits and communication as being handled in relatively angry ways (e.g., defensiveness) and marital conflicts about children as eliciting greater depressive conflict (e.g., withdrawal, sadness). Husbands also viewed conflicts concerning relatives and commitment as being handled in relatively depressive ways. The findings explicate substantive sources of midlife marital disagreements and offer future research and clinical directions.     

The impact of spouse monitoring on target behavior and recorder satisfaction

The objectives of this study were (a) to determine the impact of a spouse monitoring procedure on the target's (husband's) behavior and the recorder (wife's) view of the marriage and (b) to assess the relationship between the target's positive behaviors and the recorder's marital satisfaction rating. In one condition, husbands were informed that their behavior was being observed, whereas in a comparison group, husbands were kept unaware of the observation procedure. In both conditions, wives kept daily recordings of (a) positive behaviors emitted by their husbands and (b) perceptions of their marital relationships. No differences were found in rates of husbands' behavior or in wives' perceptions of their marriages as a function of the awareness manipulation. Analyses examining the relationship between spouse behavior and daily satisfaction ratings indicated a statistically reliable association, although the majority of variance in satisfaction ratings was attributable to unique subject variables.This article is based on a thesis submitted by the first author to the Department of Psychology of the University of Pittsburgh. The described research was supported in part by a Faculty Research Grant from the University of Pittsburgh awarded to the second author.     

Longitudinal relations between forgiveness and conflict resolution in marriage.

Does forgiveness predict later conflict resolution in married couples? Twelve-month follow-up data on conflict resolution were collected from the couples studied by F. D. Fincham, S. R. Beach, and J. Davila, who had provided earlier reports of forgiveness and conflict resolution. For wives, the positive dimension of forgiveness or benevolence predicted husbands' later reports of better conflict resolution controlling for initial levels of conflict resolution. This finding was independent of wives' marital satisfaction and the degree of hurt engendered by husbands' transgressions. For husbands, the only predictor of wives' reports of later conflict resolution was initial level of conflict resolution. The findings are discussed in terms of the direction of effect between forgiveness and conflict resolution and of the mechanisms that might link them.