4 behaviors that will kill a marriage

[glatt]

Scientific American blog has a pretty good article about 4 behaviors that can predicts with 93% certainty whether a marriage will fail or not.

Use scientifically proven methods to improve your relationship. And laugh at the Kardashians doing it exactly wrong in example videos of what not to do.

in case the enormity of what I just said didn’t sink in quite yet, solely based on how often you notice four behaviors occurring in a single, 15-minute conversation, you can predict with 93% accuracy whether or not a couple will still be married 14 years from now.

Now I’m guessing you probably want to know what these four behaviors — or, as Gottman and Levenson call them, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse — actually are. These four toxic behaviors are called contempt, criticism, stonewalling, and defensiveness.

Read the article for more info.

[Ocean's Edge]

My ex could manage all 4 in a single sentence.

I recall the first time my ex and I went off to see the marriage counselor - he had us fill in a questionnaire to which he said "if you do not make some serious changes in your relationship now - you will not be married in 5 years. It might be 6 months it might be 4 and a half years, but you will not be married in 5"

He then told my ex he had to be committed to making the process work, if he was only there to make me happy - it wouldn't work, and whether or not he ever came back was up to him.... not me nagging him.

He was still shocked when I left him within 6 months.

[footfootfoot]

Yeppers. Just shows you how many straws of crap this camel's back could take.

[richlevy]

Given all of that, I'm absolutely amazed we're coming up on 30 years........

[Aliantha]

There's a 5th one.

Neglect. Emotional and physical.

[footfootfoot]

Oh there have been many days when I would have welcomed neglect as a respite from the other four.

[Sundae]

My parents have been married for fifty-something years.
It may be because of their generation and religion, because I see issues one through to three daily. And escalated far beyond the examples shown.

I walked away from a medium-term relationship, short-term marriage because I was exhibiting all of those traits; one through to four.
I was pretty much ostracised for it, but I always knew it was the right thing to do.

My genuine fault was in marrying in the first place.
And maybe using my parents' long term dysfunctional marriage as a blueprint.
I say that, but both my siblings are happily married, so it's probably not fair.

Interesting article, anyway.

[infinite monkey]

Originally Posted by footfootfoot

Oh there have been many days when I would have welcomed neglect as a respite from the other four.

This.

[Flint]

... solely based on how often you notice four behaviors occurring in a single, 15-minute conversation, you can predict with 93% accuracy ...

This is astronomically misleading, taken out of the context provided from within the same article:

... Recording married couples talking for 15 minutes about a recent conflict that they were having in their relationship...

So, the obstensibly innocous 'conversation' is one in which the couples have been goaded into dredging up their worst behaviors.

Of ƒucking course you're going to argue if you're prompted to start an argument, about an argument.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by Flint

This is astronomically misleading, taken out of the context provided from within the same article:


So, the obstensibly innocous 'conversation' is one in which the couples have been goaded into dredging up their worst behaviors.

Of ƒucking course you're going to argue if you're prompted to start an argument, about an argument.

It helps to have a fairly reliable way to start an argument if you want to study argumentative communication.

TFA says it is not the argument that is the indicator, rather it is the nature of the argument that is the indicator. Making the person the problem and not the behavior is the problem. Fundamental attribution error and ad hominem attacks get you nowhere closer to resolution.

Not really misleading at all unless one draws conclusions from out of context snippets.

[glatt]

What Perry said. Not even remotely misleading.

[Clodfobble]

The thing I wonder is, how do these same people behave in other relationships? Are there certain people who bring out the worst in us? Are these four behaviors learned over a lifetime and only able to be solved through introspection, or can simply changing partners change everything about one's own behavior?

[footfootfoot]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

The thing I wonder is, how do these same people behave in other relationships? Are there certain people who bring out the worst in us? Are these four behaviors learned over a lifetime and only able to be solved through introspection, or can simply changing partners change everything about one's own behavior?

In my experience they are separate. My wife exhibits all four of these traits towards me, but is not that way AT ALL with her friends. I am willing to bet that it is entirely how relationships were modelled to her. Also there is a family mythology on her mothers side that is strongly anti-husband, and of course this results in deep scrutiny and fact finding missions.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

The thing I wonder is, how do these same people behave in other relationships? Are there certain people who bring out the worst in us? Are these four behaviors learned over a lifetime and only able to be solved through introspection, or can simply changing partners change everything about one's own behavior?

My marriage to Tink got trampled by these horses, with fatal (to the marriage) results.

In my experience, I see evidence of the capacity for these behaviors to appear in other relationships. I say capacity because the behaviors are not always displayed outside of marriages (I feel compelled to say I don't have anything like the Gottmans' experience at looking inside marriages though I have a lot of first hand marriage experience of my own, and I'm very interested in the subject). Back to the behaviors--Flint has a point, if you ask people about a recent conflict you're going to get an echo of that conflict. I emphatically disagree with Flint's conclusion though. I strongly believe the observations and analysis and predictions were based on HOW the parties argue and not about the argument itself.

It's this *how* that matters, and those horsemen can arrive in any argument, no spouse required. BUT, the stakes are higher with a spouse, everything is amped up with a spouse, the good and the bad. By comparison, something that might generate "contempt, criticism, stonewalling, or defensiveness" in a marriage might not be "worth it" in other relationships. Think about it, there's a whole universe of interactions that matter when your spouse is part of the conversation that don't really matter when someone else does the same thing. Think about it, this works both ways, right? There are things I'll do for my spouse that I wouldn't do for anyone else. Unfortunately, that includes being bothered/aggravated/infuriated.

In other relationships, there's often space to get away from offending behavior. OR, even if the behavior compels me to "contempt, criticism, stonewalling, or defensiveness", I can't divorce anyone BUT my spouse. Sometimes that method of arguing is just as toxic (parents/children/employers/politicians/younameit), just as unproductive, but simply can't be measured in divorce rates.

[Flint]

What is misleading is that the OP doesn't mention they were goaded into arguing. A thesis statement including the term "...a single, 15-minute conversation..." with no additional clues except "...Read the article for more info..." is not adequate to even come close to describing what this study is about. Sorry to be a stickler, and yes, like a curious intellectual I did go read the article, and I don't disagree with the article, but the OP is misleading to the maximum possible extent.

Without the qualifier:

... Recording married couples talking for 15 minutes about a recent conflict that they were having in their relationship...

...this reads like a cross between Cosmopolitan's 'ten ways to please your man' and a suicide note written by Nostradamus on a coke binge.