Marital Conflict Essay

. Marital conflict

Most studies in marital conflict pertain to three particular dimensions of communication. The first dimension is affect which refers to messages that express positive or negative feelings about another person, such as supportiveness, hostility, confirmation, coercion, sarcasm, or global positiveness or negativeness (e.g., Gottman, 1979 and Sillars and Wilmot, 1994). The second dimension to characterize conflict behaviors is whether they are constructive or destructive for the parties’ relationship. Research in the United States indicates that exiting from the relationship and neglecting the partner are destructive problem-solving responses and are more powerfully predictive of couple distress than giving voice to problems and being passive loyal (e.g., Rusbult, Johnson, & Morrow, 1986). The third dimension to characterize conflict management is engagement versus avoidance (e.g., Hocker and Wilmot, 1991 and Sillars and Wilmot, 1994). Engagement is reflected in direct, overt verbal confrontation of conflict issues, while conflict avoidance is reflected in withdrawal and aversion to dealing directly with conflict issues (Canary, Cupach, & Messman, 1995) and includes circumscribed, irrelevant, or ambiguous communication. Since the purpose of this study is to examine the effect of culture on marital conflict strategies and marital satisfaction, the discussion will be limited to the third dimension of marital conflict, engagement–avoidance, along with Rahim's styles of conflict.
References
Baucom, D.H., Shoham, V., Mueser, K.T., Daiuto, A D., & Stickle, T R. (1998). Empirically supported couple and family interventions for marital distress and adult mental health problems. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psycholog...

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...voidance in marital interaction: A longitudinal view of five types of couples. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. 61(1). 6-15. 4. Jacobson, N., & Addis, M. (1993). Research on couples and couple therapy: What do we know? Where are we going? Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. 61. 85-93.
5. Noller, P., & Fitzpatrick, M. A. (1991). Markal communicafion. In A. Booth (Ed.),Contemporary families: Looking forward, looking back, (pp. 42-53). Minneapohs, MN: National Council on Family Relations.

Marriage and Conflict
Marital satisfaction and other related contacts (e.g., marital adjustment, marital quality, and marital happiness) are studied widely by family researchers. However, there is no consensus regarding their definition and measurement. Some scholars have argued that these constmcts are not synonymous (e.g., Heyman, Sayers, & Bellack, 1994;