The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country's Foremost Relationship Expert

Even if I could not hear the conversation between Mack the stonewaller and his wife, Rita, I would be able to predict their divorce simply by looking at his physiological readings. When we monitor couples for bodily changes during a tense discussion, we can see just how physically distressing flooding is. One of the most apparent of these physical

At the heart of the Seven Principles approach is the simple truth that happy marriages are based on a deep friendship. By this I mean a mutual respect for and enjoyment of each other’s company. These couples tend to know each other intimately—they are well versed in each other’s likes, dislikes, personality quirks, hopes, and dreams. They have an a

When a marriage goes sour, husband and wife are not the only ones to suffer—the children do, too. In a study I conducted of sixty-three preschoolers, those being raised in homes where there was great marital hostility had chronically elevated levels of stress hormones compared with the other children studied. We don’t know what the long-term reperc

No doubt, the first time Peter and Cynthia argued about car-washing, he wasn’t so disrespectful. He probably offered a simple complaint like, “I think you should wash your own car. It costs too much to always have someone else wash it.” But as they kept disagreeing about this, his complaints turned to global criticisms, such as: “You always spend t

Men and women are from different planets. According to a rash of bestselling books, men and women can’t get along because males are “from Mars” and females “from Venus.” However, happily married heterosexual couples are also “aliens” to each other. Gender…

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“positive sentiment override,

One important message of these findings is that it is not wise to stay in a bad marriage for the sake of your children. It is clearly harmful to raise kids in a home that is consumed by hostility. A peaceful divorce is preferable to endless marital warfare. Unfortunately, many divorces are not peaceful. Too often there is mutual enmity between the

Repair attempts save marriages not just because they decrease emotional tension between spouses, but because by lowering the stress level they also prevent your heart from racing and making you feel flooded. When the four horsemen rule a couple’s communication, repair attempts often don’t even get noticed.…

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Most couples enter marriage with high hopes and great expectations. In a happy marriage, couples tend to look back on their early days fondly. Even if the wedding didn’t go off perfectly, they are likely to remember the highlights rather than the low points. The same goes for each other. They remember how positively they felt early on, how excited