Widening spheres of impact: The role of forgiveness in marital and family functioning.

This study examined relations between aspects of family functioning and positive and negative dimensions of forgiveness. Increased understanding of one's partner and decreased anger about betrayal characterize positive forgiveness, whereas experiences such as holding a grudge and desiring revenge indicate negative forgiveness. The sample included 87 wives and 74 husbands who reported experiencing a significant betrayal, their partners, and their adolescent children. Analyses of reported forgiveness revealed that more negative forgiveness was associated with lower marital satisfaction for husbands and wives; trust partially mediated this relationship for husbands and wives. Greater positive forgiveness reported by husbands and wives predicted their own reports of a stronger parenting alliance, whereas greater negative forgiveness reported by husbands and wives predicted their spouses' reports of a weaker parenting alliance. For wives, more negative forgiveness also predicted higher levels of children's perceived parental conflict, and parents' reported conflict mediated this association for wives. Findings suggest that forgiveness of a marital betrayal is significantly associated with marital satisfaction, the parenting alliance, and children's perceptions of parental marital functioning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Family health and mental health six years after economic stress and unemployment

This study is a follow-up of 39 working class couples who were interviewed after suffering economic stress or unemployment and again six years later. Repeated measures related to economics, stress, family functioning, anxiety, and depression were collected and analyzed for couples and for husbands and wives separately. A model of long-term coping was suggested for future testing. Initially stressed families appeared to grow stronger. Mental health correlated negatively to family problems. Depressed wives seemed to maintain their depression over time if they perceived family life as stressful. Irrespective of marital problems, husbands were less likely to stay depressed.     

Time spent in housework and leisure: Links with parents' physiological recovery from work.

Spouses' balancing of housework and leisure activities at home may affect their recovery from work. This paper reports on a study of everyday family life in which 30 dual-earner couples were tracked around their homes by researchers who recorded their locations and activities every 10 min. For women, the most frequently pursued activities at home were housework, communication, and leisure; husbands spent the most time in leisure activities, followed by communication and housework. Spouses differed in their total time at home and their proportion of time devoted to leisure and housework activities, with wives observed more often in housework and husbands observed more often in leisure activities. Both wives and husbands who devoted more time to housework had higher levels of evening cortisol and weaker afternoon-to-evening recovery. For wives, husbands' increased housework time also predicted stronger evening cortisol recovery. When both spouses' activities were entered in the same model, leisure predicted husbands' evening cortisol, such that husbands who apportioned more time to leisure, and whose wives apportioned less time to leisure, showed stronger after-work recovery. These results suggest that the division of labor within couples may have implications for physical health. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Familial coping with cancer in childhood and adolescence. Possibilities for standardized assessment with a self-assessment method: results of an empirical pilot study

44 parents of pediatric oncology patients answered mailed questionnaires about their own coping and about their sick children's coping and bodily complaints during oncological therapy. Most of the families coped well from parents' view. The dominant coping style of the parents consisted of active, problem-focused coping strategies in combination with an optimistic basic attitude, maintainance of family cohesion and belief in god or search for a meaning of the illness. The children and adolescents used predominantly adaptive coping strategies. The parental problem-group with a predominantly maladaptive coping-style reported low family cohesion, high depression, high wishful thinking and minimization. The maladaptive children and adolescents were rated as more socially withdrawing, more irritable, less optimistic and competent as well as less compliant. Strong correlations were found between parents' and their children's coping. Problem families with a special need for psychosocial support can early be identified by the coping questionnaires used in this study. Prospective longitudinal studies with multi-methodal and multi-perspective designs should be conducted to reach a better understanding of the family coping process in case of childhood and adolescence cancer.     

Neuroticism and marital satisfaction: The mediating role played by the sexual relationship.

Why is Neuroticism so harmful to marriage and other intimate relationships? Given that such relationships generally involve a sexual component, the current longitudinal study explored whether the apparent negative impact of own and partner's Neuroticism on marriage could be explained by dissatisfaction with the sexual relationship. Just after their weddings, 72 couples reported their marital satisfaction, sexual satisfaction, and Neuroticism. One year later, they again reported their marital and sexual satisfaction. Own Neuroticism predicted lower levels of concurrent marital and sexual satisfaction among husbands and wives, declines in sexual satisfaction among husbands and wives, and declines in marital satisfaction among wives. Partner's Neuroticism predicted lower levels of concurrent marital satisfaction among husbands and wives, lower levels of concurrent sexual satisfaction among husbands, and declines in sexual satisfaction among husbands. Consistent with predictions, sexual satisfaction mediated every effect of own and partner Neuroticism on marital satisfaction. Results highlight the prominent role played by the sexual relationship in accounting for marital outcomes and thus suggest specific processes through which Neuroticism may affect the marriage. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Marital quality, coping with conflict, marital complaints, and affection in couples with a depressed wife.

This study compared 3 groups of women--outpatient depressed, inpatient depressed, and community control--and their husbands on a range of variables including marital functioning and styles of coping with conflict. Outpatient depressed couples reported greater marital distress and more destructive and less constructive tactics for resolving conflict than did community control couples. They also were more likely to have been previously married and to express regrets about having married their current husbands. There were smaller and less consistent differences for couples with inpatient depressed spouses, although inpatient couples with younger wives were similar to outpatient depressed couples. Both groups of depressed women and their husbands reported fewer expressions of affection and more complaints about the marriage than did control couples. Results are discussed in terms of interpersonal perspectives on depression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Body image and marital satisfaction: Evidence for the mediating role of sexual frequency and sexual satisfaction.

How does women’s body image shape their interpersonal relationships? Based on recent theories of risk regulation and empirical evidence that sex is an emotionally risky behavior, we predicted that women’s body image would predict increased sexual frequency and thus increased sexual and marital satisfaction for both members of established relationships. The current study of 53 recently married couples provided results consistent with this prediction. Specifically, wives’ perceptions of their sexual attractiveness were positively associated with both wives’ and husbands’ marital satisfaction, controlling for wives’ body mass index (BMI) wives’ global self-esteem, wives’ neuroticism, and reports of whether or not the couple was trying to get pregnant, and both of these associations were mediated by increased sexual frequency and higher sexual satisfaction. Notably, wives’ perceptions of their sexual attractiveness accounted for 6% of the variance in husbands’ marital satisfaction and 19% of the variance in wives’ marital satisfaction that was unique from BMI and the other controls. Accordingly, marital interventions may greatly benefit by addressing women’s body esteem. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effect of couple illness perception congruence on psychological adjustment in women with rheumatoid arthritis.

Objective: To characterize similarities and differences in illness perceptions between women with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and their husbands, and examine whether illness perception congruence predicted wives' subsequent psychological adjustment. Design: Women with RA and their husbands (N = 190 couples) recruited from community and clinical settings completed mailed surveys at baseline and 4-month follow-up. Main Outcome Measures: Data for this investigation included illness perceptions in partners and illness severity, marital variables, and psychological adjustment in wives. Results: In general, wives and husbands had similar views of RA. Couple congruence concerning women's personal control over RA and its cyclic nature predicted better psychological adjustment in women 4 months later. Post hoc tests showed better psychological adjustment in wives from couples with similar optimistic beliefs about personal control, illness coherence, and RA consequences, when compared to those in couples with similar pessimistic beliefs. Furthermore, when partners disagreed about RA's consequences, wives fared better when husbands overestimated rather than underestimated their beliefs. In contrast, couple congruence about the emotions and timeline of RA was unrelated to adjustment. Conclusion: It may be important for husbands to understand wives' views on their control over RA and its cyclic nature. Furthermore, wives may benefit when they share optimistic views with their husbands about RA, and when their husbands avoid underestimating RA's consequences. Developing interventions to enhance partners' illness understanding may be beneficial. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stressful situations in caregiving: Relations between caregiver coping and well-being.

We examined ways in which caregivers cope with stressful caregiving situations and the relations between coping strategies and caregivers' psychosocial well-being. Respondents were 58 family caregivers to patients discharged from a rehabilitation hospital. Caregivers identified a recent stressful event in caregiving and indicated strategies used to cope with this event. After controlling for patients' impairment level, analyses indicated that caregivers engaging in more escape–avoidance coping reported greater depression and more conflict in their personal relationships. Those using more positive reappraisal demonstrated greater positive affect. Younger caregivers, many of whom were women, used more avoidance strategies. Results have implications for therapeutic interventions with family caregivers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prospective predictors of parenting satisfaction for fathers and mothers with young children.

Data from husbands and wives from 48 couples with young children (mean age?=?2.71 years) were used to assess whether each spouse's parenting satisfaction assessed 8 years after marriage (Year 8) was predicted by parents' personality characteristics, marital quality, and social support assessed at the beginning of the marriage (Year 1). With controls for all other variables, fathers' Year 8 parenting satisfaction was predicted by their own Year 1 instrumentality, whereas mothers' Year 8 parenting satisfaction was predicted by their own Year 1 expressiveness. These prospective relations were not moderated by child-related characteristics and persisted with controls for Year 8 marital satisfaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal predictors of dieting practices among married couples.

The relations between couples' marital quality and dieting behavior were examined. One-hundred eighty-seven married couples' dieting behaviors, marital quality, body mass index, weight concerns, depression, and self-esteem were assessed. Results indicate that the relation between healthy dieting behaviors and marital quality is similar for both husbands and wives. However, among wives, marital discord predicted unhealthy dieting behaviors, even after wives' body mass index, weight concerns, self-esteem, and depression were controlled for. Furthermore, wives' self-esteem interacted with marital quality when predicting unhealthy dieting. These findings suggest gender differences in the relations between marital quality and dieting behaviors and are consistent with previous research suggesting that men and women have differential response patterns to marital disharmony, with women tending to internalize negative affect experienced in their marriage. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment and marital functioning: Comparison of spouses with continuous-secure, earned-secure, dismissing, and preoccupied attachment stances.

In a sample of 138 couples, the present study examined whether individuals' marital functioning related to both their own and their partner's attachment stance. Earned-secure wives managed their affect as well as continuous-secure wives during problem-solving discussions and better than preoccupied or dismissing wives. However, preoccupied and dismissing wives did not exhibit markedly different patterns of affect regulation in their marriages. Regarding individuals' marital functioning and partners' attachment stance, neither husbands' behavior nor perceptions related to their wives' attachment stance. However, wives of continuous-secure husbands exhibited more positive marital behavior than wives of dismissing and earned-secure husbands. Findings are discussed in terms of how attachment working models may account for both continuities and discontinuities between earlier caregiving experiences and functioning in adult relationships. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"How long will I suffer?" versus "How long will you suffer?" A self-other effect in affective forecasting.

This research presents evidence that people predict longer durations of negative affect for others than for themselves. It is argued that this self-other effect is based on the asymmetric availability of knowledge about psychological strategies that reduce negative affective experiences. Specifically, because people have available knowledge about their own coping strategies, they use this information when making predictions about their affect. The lack of information about others' coping strategies leads to longer predictions of affect duration for others, creating the self-other effect. A series of studies demonstrated this self-other effect, its source, and its boundary conditions. Specifically, the self-other effect occurred for negative but not for positive events, it was stronger when participants predicted affect duration for unfamiliar others than when participants predicted affect duration for familiar others, and the impact of the self versus other focus on affective forecasts was mediated by the availability of knowledge about coping strategies. In addition, alternative explanations for the self-other effect were ruled out. The implications for biases in affective forecasting are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Maternal self-discrepancies, interrole conflict, and negative affect among married professional women with children.

This study applied self-discrepancy theory (E. T. Higgins, R. N. Bond, R. Klein, & T. Strauman, 1986) to the study of the maternal self-concept and interrole conflict for married professional women with children. The participants, 103 married professional women with young children, completed questionnaires. Each of the 4 self-discrepancy variables was a positive predictor of positive interrole conflict and, with one exception (actual–own:ought–own self-discrepancy), a negative predictor of coping effectiveness. Both structural role redefinition and superwoman coping strategies were positively related to coping effectiveness. Use of the structural role redefinition strategy was positively associated with work support, spousal support, and social support. Work support was negatively related to anxiety and depression, but no significant relations were found between spousal support and other variables. In regression models, self-discrepancy was related to both anxiety and depression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

For better or worse? Coregulation of couples’ cortisol levels and mood states.

Although a majority of adults live with a close relationship partner, little is known about whether and how partners’ momentary affect and physiology covary, or “coregulate.” This study used a dyadic multilevel modeling approach to explore the coregulation of spouses’ mood states and cortisol levels in 30 married couples who sampled saliva and reported on mood states 4 times per day for 3 days. For both husbands and wives, own cortisol level was positively associated with partner’s cortisol level, even after sampling time was controlled. For wives, marital satisfaction weakened the strength of this effect. Partner’s negative mood was positively associated with own negative mood for both husbands and wives. Marital satisfaction fully moderated this effect, reducing the strength of the association between one’s own and one’s partner’s negative mood states. Spouses’ positive moods were not correlated. As expected, within-couple coregulation coefficients were stronger when mood and cortisol were sampled in the early morning and evening, when spouses were together at home, than during the workday. The results suggest that spouses’ fluctuations in negative mood and cortisol levels are linked over several days and that marital satisfaction may buffer spouses from their partners’ negative mood or stress state. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceptions of Injustice in Family Work: The Role of Psychological Distress.

During the transition to parenthood, perceived imbalances in family work typically increase. Little is known, however, about which individuals are especially prone to perceive unfairness in the division of family work during this time. Using data from a longitudinal study of married couples expecting their first child and controlling for marital distress and other relevant variables, we observed that when husbands were psychologically distressed, both they and their wives were subsequently more likely to perceive unfairness to wives in the division of family work. No analogous significant and prospective effects of wives' levels of distress on their own or their husbands' perceptions of unfairness were found. We also found that once wives perceived the amount of child care they did as unfair, both they and their husbands were later more likely to experience psychological distress, controlling for marital distress and other relevant variables. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Divorce and children: fact proven and interval between petition and decree

This article presents some basic statistics on divorce in England and Wales in 1994 which are relevant to the current debate on the reform of divorce law. Over one half (56 per cent) of all divorces were to couples with children aged under 16 in their family. The most frequent fact proven by wives was the unreasonable behaviour of their husbands (54 per cent of all divorces granted to wives) whilst the most frequent fact proven by husbands was their wives' adultery--37 per cent of all divorces granted to husbands. These proportions were even higher amongst divorcing wives and husbands who had children aged under 16 in their family; 60 and 45 per cent, respectively. The median interval of time between filing the petition and obtaining the decree varied little across the different groups of divorcing couples. Overall, the median interval was just under 7 months. About one in 9 couples were granted divorce within 4 months of filing the petition, 2 in 5 within 6 months, and approximately 4 in 5 divorces were granted within one year.     

The nature and predictors of the trajectory of change in marital quality for husbands and wives over the first 10 years of marriage.

Four parameters of the trajectory of change in marital quality (initial status as well as linear, quadratic, and cubic patterns of change) were estimated for husbands and wives over the first 10 years of marriage (n?=?522 couples at Year 1 and 93 couples at Year 10). Both husbands and wives started their trajectories of change at fairly high levels of marital quality and showed a cubic pattern of change such that marital quality declined fairly rapidly in the early years of marriage, stabilized, and then declined again. Whereas individual-differences variables predicted the initial status of the trajectory, husbands and wives living with only their biological children showed a steeper decline in marital quality than husbands and wives living without children or stepchildren. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Proxy informant reliability and bias in epidemiological research: analysis of a screening questionnaire for mental disorders

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the reliability, magnitude and direction of the resulting bias in the application of a screening instrument for mental disorders by considering proxy informants in comparison to primary informants. METHODS: Data are taken from a general morbidity community-based survey carried out in 520 randomly selected households of an industrial area of the Metropolitan Region of Salvador, the capital of Bahia state, Brazil. During the pilot phase, the first 70 families of the total sample were asked to participate in the evaluation of research instruments. The Questionnaire of Adult Psychiatric Morbidity, QAPM, consists of 44 questions about psychiatric symptoms widely used in Brazil. The husbands and wives of the selected families answered QAPM questions regarding themselves and their respective partners. One family refused to participate. The Kappa index was estimated for each QAPM question. To assess the magnitude and direction of bias, the proportional variation of prevalence was estimated from proxy and primary respondents. Each informant was analyzed as a primary informant when answering about his/her own symptoms and as a proxy informant when answering those about his/her partner. RESULTS: Proxy informants as compared to primary informants show weak reliability, as measured by the Kappa Index, particularly when husbands reported on their wives' symptoms. An overall underestimation of prevalence estimates was found, which reveals the potential negative bias with the use of proxy informants for psychological symptoms. No bias was found for only two questions (lack of appetite and globus hystericus) when women were taken as proxy informants for their husbands. In addition, departures of proxy informants from primary informant-based estimates were greater among men than to women. CONCLUSIONS: Proxy informants underestimate the occurrence of psychological symptoms in this community-based study. When the feasibility of a research project, based on the QAPM depends on the use of proxies, wives may be recommended as better informants than their husbands.     

Integration of home and nonhome roles: Women's conflict and coping behavior.

Investigated the conflict that women experience between their home and nonhome roles. 115 women (mean age 38.1 yrs) who (a) were married and living with their husbands, (b) had at least 1 child, and (c) were attending college completed questionnaires; their husbands completed similar questionnaires. It was found that the time demands of the student role were more strongly associated with conflict for women whose husbands held relatively traditional sex-role attitudes than for women whose husbands held relatively nontraditional attitudes. In addition, traditionally oriented women tended to use reactive coping strategies to deal with intense conflicts. Furthermore, reactive coping strategies were perceived to be less successful than more active strategies. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)