Behavioral cues in the judgment of marital satisfaction: A linear regression analysis.

40 undergraduate judges rated the level of marital satisfaction of 24 couples shown on videotape and then listed the behavioral cues used in making their judgments. The stimulus tapes were problem-solving interactions of both distressed and nondistressed couples. The tapes were scored for the actual occurrence of these cues, and multiple regression regression analyses were used to construct a model of the judges' cue usage and an actuarial prediction model using these same cues. Results indicate that (a) untrained judges were able to make discriminations of marital satisfaction-distress with significant but low validity; (b) judges' ratings were correlated with couples' overall rates of aversive but not of supportive behavior; (c) judges were able to specify useful behavioral cues, the most valid of which were compromise and attention; (d) the actuarial prediction model was more valid than the judges themselves. The utility for behavioral research of defining interpersonal behavior in terms of response-consequence units is discussed. (26 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)