The Endorsement of Communication Conflict Rules as a Function of Engagement, Marriage and Marital Ideology

Abstract

The maintenance of relationships is examined using a rules-based perspective in which engaged and married couples rated how often they followed a number of communication rules for conflict management in the marriage. In addition, couples were measured on their ideolgy about marriage using Fitzpatrick's (1988) marital typology descriptions. The results reveal four basic communicative rule dimensions dealing with conflict that include signaling positive understanding to one's partner, being rational, being concise and showing consideration to the partner. Analyses revealed marital status and marital type differences in terms of rule endorsement. Other differences attached to judgments of the applicability of the rules along a number of situational dimensions such as applying more in public/private, applying to men/women, not being important/extremely important, applying only in conflict vs other situations, and applying only to unhappy vs happy marriages. Most importantly, the results indicate that endorsement of rules regarding communication of positive understanding is positively related to relationship quality for all but engaged, independent couples. Results are discussed in terms of rules-based perspectives for expectancies of marriage.