夫妻问题解决和社会支持、依恋安全性与婚姻质量的关系

The Relationship between Couple Problem Solving and Social Support, Attachment Security and Marital Quality

以41对新婚夫妻为研究对象,采用观察法与问卷法相结合的方式,对夫妻冲突和支持、依恋安全性和婚姻质量之间的关系进行探索。结果发现:(1)夫妻问题解决中的(而不是社会支持)积极行为(而不是消极行为)能正向预测妻子的婚姻质量;夫妻社会支持(而不是问题解决)中的消极行为(而不是积极行为)能反向预测丈夫的婚姻质量;(2)妻子的依恋安全性在夫妻问题解决积极行为对妻子婚姻质量的影响中起完全中介作用,而丈夫的依恋安全性在夫妻社会支持消极行为对丈夫婚姻质量的影响中不起作用。

Couple communication plays a crucial role in marriage life. Previous research mainly focused on the communication behavior as indicators of marital quality; less attention has been devoted to the mechanism of the communication behavior that impacts marital quality. Previous research indicated that attachment security was associated with the couple communication and their marital quality. The purpose of the present study was to explore the mechanism between couples＇ observed communication behavior, attachment security and marital quality. To avoid shared covariance due to the methods, we used the observational paradigm to catch couples＇ communication behavior. The identified 41 newly-weds community couples were recruited by lab members, who contacted acquaintances to locate couples who met the eligibility criteria. Couples were visited in their homes by trained interviewers. After completing self-report measures, including the Marriage Quality Index and the Adult Attachment Scales, partners were reunited for four 10-min videotaped discussions, which included two problem solving tasks and two social support tasks. For the problem solving task, one randomly chosen spouse was asked to ＂talk about something you identified as conflict between you and your spouse and how you would like to solve this problem＂, and couples were told to ＂be involved in the discussion and try to solve this problem＂, and then exchange role for the next 10-min discussion. For the social support task, one randomly chosen spouse was asked to ＂talk about something you would like change about yourself and avoid selecting any topics that would be a sources of tension within relationship,＂ and the partner was told to ＂be involved in the discussion and respond however you wish＂. The Iowa Family Interaction Rating Scale coding system was used to encode the couples＇ interaction. The Intra-class Correlation Coefficient values reflecting inter rater reliability were adequate in each interaction. The results revealed that the couple＇s positive behavior in problem solving significantly positively predicted wives＇ marital quality, and negative behavior in social support significantly negatively predicted husbands＇ marital quality. Additionally, wives＇ attachment security served to mediate the association between couple problem solving, positive behavior and wife marital satisfaction, while the attachment security of husband did not play any role between couples＇ communication behavior and husbands＇ marital satisfaction. These findings suggest that communication behavior and attachment security have different impact mechanisms on husbands and wives＇ marital quality. It indicated that wives and husbands were vulnerable to different behaviors in different contexts. Wives value the positive behaviors in problem solving context and husbands are sensitive to how their partners support them when needed. We speculate that the key points of clinical intervention will be different for wives and husbands. For the limitation of resources and sample size, we should be cautious to apply these findings to other samples. However, the present study was the first time to apply observational study paradigm in couple research, which opens a new window for the methodology issue in this field in China.