This correlational study attempted to determine if the Outcome Questionnaire can be used to collect the same information as the Revised Dyadic Adjustment scale in marital assessment. Both measures are common pretreatment assessments and have relational components. The study used secondary data from the Utah State University Marriage and Family Therapy Clinic. Reliability and correlational tests were performed and the results indicate that the assessments measure different constructs. There also were no statistically significant correlations when comparing the measures by gender, marital distress, and marital satisfaction. Implications are discussed including the formulation of new clinical cut-off scores and the importance of using both measures to perform better assessments.

Predicting divorce potential has been of interest to researchers and clinicians. The Marital Status Inventory (Weiss & Ceretto, 1980) was developed to provide information about clients' perceived divorce potential. The MSI has been widely used but there have been complaints about the negatively worded items from clients, therapists, and researchers. Therefore, this study compared a revised form of the MSI (MSI-R has no negatively worded items) with the original format. There were three purposes of the study. The first was to assess the reliability and validity of the MSI-R. The second purpose was to see if the MSI-R continued to distinguish between types of therapy couples attended (marital versus other therapy). The third and final purpose of the study was to assess the ability of the MSI-R to assess divorce potential with a remarital sample. It was found that the MSI-R is on face value equally as valid as the original MSI. There was a lack of support for discriminate validity. The MSI-R was found to be internally consistent (alpha = .83), therefore reliable. Clients found the revised items to be more easily understood and readable than the original items. The MSI and MSI-R were significantly correlated indicating that they apparently measure the same concepts. Results showed that both groups scored on the low end of the scale indicating that the sample was not a very divorce prone group. There did not appear to be any difference with regards to mean scores on the MSI and MSI-R between marital and remarital groups. While the MSI-R appears to be a promising replacement for the MSI, further research is warranted to provide sufficient evidence of validity.

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of the gaming behaviors of married individuals and couples who play Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game(s) (MMORPGs) including gaming addiction, time spent gaming, satisfaction in gaming participation, gaming interaction (between joint gaming spouses), and socio-demographic variables and the subsequent marital satisfaction levels of both individuals in the couple. Hypotheses were generally supported, excluding the hours spent gaming. 685 couples were separated and analyzed according to whether both individuals in the marriage gamed or just one individual gamed (couple-gaming type). Couples in which only one individual gamed (individual-gamer couples) had significantly lower marital satisfaction than all other groups and couples in which both gamed about the same amount of time (equal-gamers) held the highest marital satisfaction of the groups. Prediction models of marital satisfaction were determined for each couple-gaming type. The strongest predictions present in most of the models for marital satisfaction were the frequency that the couple retired to bed at the same time and the frequency that the couple quarreled specifically about gaming. Much MMORPG research has been presented on youth and adults, however to date there is no research on married gamers. Recent research on the video game habits of emerging adults called for further in depth investigation of the implications of video game use in the family formation stage of life.

This study evaluates the efficacy of a self-guided, low-intensity curriculum, Marriage Moments, based on Fowers' (2000) virtues model of marital quality that emphasizes friendship, generosity, justice and loyalty. The Marriage Moments program consists of a guidebook and a video that were designed to strengthen marriages during the transition to parenthood and is used in the context of a home visitation program for first-time parents. Participants in the study included 119 married couples who had recently given birth to their first child. They were assigned to either a treatment, comparison or control group. The treatment group received the Marriage Moments curriculum as well as the Welcome Baby home visitation curriculum, the comparison group only received the Welcome Baby curriculum and the control group received neither program. Data were gathered through a battery of self- and spouse-report measures given at 3-months, 4-months, and 9-months postpartum. Relationship outcome measures included in this study were the Marital Virtues Profile, Revised-Dyadic Adjustment Scale, RELATE Satisfaction subscale, Transition Adjustment Scale, Father Involvement Scale, Household Labor Scale, and Maternal Depression Scale. Despite positive evaluations of the program from participants, analyses revealed a lack of significant, positive effects for members of the treatment group. Further research is needed before reliable conclusions can be drawn about the value of a marital virtues model as a guide for low intensity intervention.