Conflict and Withdrawal During Marital Interaction: The Roles of Hostility and Defensiveness

Abstract

The present study examined the hypothesis that hostile and defensive personality characteristics contribute to conflict and withdrawal within an important social relationship, marriage. A total of 90 newly wed couples participated in a videotaped discussion concerning areas of disagreement in their marriage. Couples' interactions were coded using the Marital Interaction Coding System (MICS), and codes were aggregated to assess conflict engagement and withdrawal. Among husbands, the combination of high levels of hostility and low levels of defensiveness was associated with a greater percentage of conflict. Among wives, this same personality pattern was associated with a greater percentage of withdrawal Both of these findings held after controlling for marital satisfaction, highlighting the importance of personality for social interactions. Moreover, the results support the tenability of Smith's psychosocial vulnerability model of personality and health, which posits that certain personality characteristics are associated with negative interpersonal consequences that may heighten vulnerability to illness.