| Abstract: | Conversational themes can be viewed as a form of met communication about relationships. We suggest that the prominent themes in the conversations of spouses identify factors assumed to have an important effect on the relationship. Further, different ways of looking at marriage are reflected in the use of particular content themes. A typology of content themes was derived from transcripts of conversations and the typology was used to code the discussions of married couples. The content themes of different marital types (i.e., traditional, separate, and independent) and more and less satisfied spouses were compared. As expected, traditional couples emphasized communal themes, such as togetherness, and separate couples emphasized individualistic themes, such as personality and separateness. Although the effects of marital satisfaction were not consistent, satisfaction tended to be positively associated with communal and impersonal themes and negatively associated with individual themes. Generally, the results confirmed predicted relationships between content themes and self-reports about the marriage. |
