abstract: This dissertation examined Mexican American individuals' romantic relationships within two distinct developmental periods, adolescence and adulthood. Study 1 used latent class analysis to explore whether 12th grade Mexican Americans' (N = 218) romantic relationship characteristics, cultural values, and gender created unique romantic relationship profiles. Results suggested a three-class solution: higher quality, satisfactory quality, and lower quality romantic relationships. Subsequently, associations between profiles and adolescents' adjustment variables were examined via regression analyses. Adolescents with higher and satisfactory quality romantic relationships reported greater future family expectations, higher self-esteem, and fewer externalizing symptoms than adolescents with lower quality romantic relationships. Similarly, adolescents with higher quality romantic relationships reported greater academic self-efficacy and fewer sexual partners than adolescents with lower quality romantic relationships. Finally, adolescents with higher quality romantic relationships also reported greater future family expectations and higher academic self-efficacy than adolescents with satisfactory quality romantic relationships. To summarize, results suggested that adolescents engaged in three unique types of romantic relationships with higher quality being most optimal for their adjustment. Study 2 used latent growth modeling to examine marital partners' (N = 466) intra- and inter-individual changes of acculturative stress, depressive symptoms, and marital quality. On average across the seven years, husbands' acculturative stress remained steady, but wives' significantly decreased; partners' depressive symptoms remained relatively steady, but their marital quality significantly decreased. Although partners' experiences of acculturative stress were less similar than their experiences of depressive symptoms and marital quality, overall their experiences were interconnected. Significant spillover and crossover effects emerged between partners' initial levels of acculturative stress and depressive symptoms and between depressive symptoms and marital quality. Moreover, changes in husbands' depressive symptoms were negatively associated with changes in their marital quality. Overall, results suggested that partners' experiences were interconnected across time. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Family and Human Development 2014

Este trabalho teve por objetivo verificar evidências de validade para um instrumento de avaliação de estratégias de resolução de conflitos conjugais e investigar o uso dessas estratégias por casais residentes no Rio Grande do Sul. Para tanto, o trabalho foi dividido em três artigos. O Artigo I buscou evidências de validade para o Conflict Resolution Behavior Questionnaire (CRBQ). O Artigo II verificou o uso de estratégias de resolução de conflitos entre homens e mulheres, sua associação a variáveis sociodemográficas e do relacionamento. Por fim o Artigo III identificou perfis de resolução de conflitos, associando-os à qualidade conjugal. Os participantes foram 750 casais heterossexuais, residentes no Rio Grande do Sul, e que coabitavam há, no mínimo, seis meses. Os resultados do Artigo I demonstraram evidências de que a versão brasileira do instrumento é válida para a avaliação das estratégias de resolução de conflitos conjugais. O Artigo II indicou que há associação da resolução do conflito conjugal à prática de alguma religião, ao tempo de relacionamento e ao momento do ciclo vital. No Artigo III, quatro perfis foram identificados: Evitador, Validador, Hostil e Volátil. Os aspectos que podem favorecer o encaminhamento construtivo dos conflitos pelos membros do casal e os níveis de qualidade conjugal associados a cada perfil identificado são discutidos. / This study aimed to verify validity evidences for an instrument for assessment of marital conflict resolution strategies and to investigate the use of these strategies by couples living in Rio Grande do Sul. To achieve this objective, this study is divided in three papers. Paper I investigated validity evidences for the Conflict Resolution Behavior Questionnaire (CRBQ). Paper II verified conflict resolution strategies used by men and women, its association with sociodemographic and relationship variables, and identified conflict resolution profiles. Participants were 750 heterosexual couples, who lived in Rio Grande do Sul state in Brazil and cohabited for, at least, six months. Paper I showed evidences that the Brazilian version of the instrument is valid for the assessment of conflict resolution strategies. Paper II indicated that marital conflict resolution was associated with religious practice, length of relationship and moment of the life cycle. Paper III identified four profiles: Avoider, Validator, Hostile and Volatile. The aspects that can promote constructive management of conflicts by spouses and the marital quality associated with each profile are discussed.

Caregiving, specifically caregiver burden, is commonly related to decreased psychological well-being. Conversely, marital quality is positively related to psychological well-being, though existing literature presents mixed findings as to whether or not a gender difference exists in this relationship. The current study examined the relationship between objective and subjective spousal caregiver burden and psychological distress with marital quality as a moderator. Gender differences in this relationship were also explored. 1,066 spousal caregivers from the National Study of Caregiving (NSOC) were used to estimate cross-sectional moderation models and plot significant interactions in Mplus. Results indicated a significant positive relationship between subjective caregiver burden and psychological distress, and higher marital quality protected against psychological distress in this relationship. The connection between objective caregiver burden and psychological distress was not significant, and no gender differences were found in the moderation of marital quality. These findings suggest that perceptions of caregiver burden are important for the psychological health of spousal caregivers, and higher marital quality may be an effective buffer of this relationship regardless of gender. Spousal caregivers who perceive caregiving to be highly burdensome may benefit from improving their marital quality to protect against negative psychological health outcomes.

This study examines relationships between the division of housework and childcare and marital love and conflict and perceived fairness as a mediator of those relationships. Gender role ideology is also examined as a moderator of the relationships between the division of labor predictors and perceived fairness. To this end 112 working-class, dual-earner couples having their first child were interviewed at three time points during the first year of parenthood after mothers returned to work. Findings indicate that wives’ reported greater marital love when their husbands performed more housework and more childcare, with fairness as a mediator of those relations. Husbands’ greater participation in both housework and childcare was directly related to their reports of marital love. For marital conflict, wives reported less conflict when husbands performed more childcare with perceived fairness as a mediator. Husbands reported less conflict when they performed a greater proportion of housework, with wives’ perceived fairness as a mediator. The division of childcare and perceived fairness were more strongly related for wives with egalitarian gender role ideology than for more traditional wives.

Today's society appears to have become focused on the individual and his/her exclusive needs in relationships. Self-sacrifice has seemingly become a forgotten value and behavior. The motives for sacrificing for another can widely vary for each individual. This study examined the effects of couples' sacrificing behaviors and the motives for sacrificing on the couples' marital quality. In this research, a random sample of 138 couples from Oakland, CA; Phoenix, AZ; Ogden, UT; and Atlanta, GA were assessed on these variables using the Self Perception of Sacrifice, Partner Perception of Sacrifice, Motives for Sacrifice, Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale, and Personal Assessment of Intimacy in Relationships measures. Analyzing the data with structural equation modeling showed that approach and avoidance motives for sacrifice were related to the individual's marital quality. The approach motives were also related to the individual's actual frequency of sacrificing, but only wives' avoidance motives were a predictor of her frequency in sacrificing. Husband's sacrificing frequency was a strong predictor of his own marital quality and also his wife's. The wife's frequency of sacrificing was also connected with her and his marital quality, but was not as strong of a predictor as his frequency of sacrificing. In examining the partner effects, only wives' approach and avoidance motives had an effect upon their husband's marital quality. Husband's approach and avoidance motives were not related to his wife's marital quality; rather, the husband's actual frequency of sacrifice and the wife's perception of his sacrificing influenced her marital quality. Husbands' and wives' approach motives were associated with their partner's frequency of sacrifice, but their avoidance motives were not significant predictors of their partner's frequency of sacrifice. Clinical implications and directions for future research are discussed.

Couples learn to negotiate a complex intersection between household labor and family processes. Using both observational coding and questionnaire self report, this study examined the relationship between father and mothers' reported equality with their division-of-labor, their satisfaction with division-of-labor and their respective positive parenting as observed in taped interaction with a target child while controlling for quality of the relationship between the parents. Findings showed that egalitarian division of labor was positively related to satisfaction in division of labor and that egalitarian division of labor was a significant predictor of mothers' relationship quality, but not fathers' relationship quality. It also showed that fathers', but not mothers', marital relationship quality was found to be correlated with positive parenting and satisfaction with division of labor was a significant predictor of positive parenting for mothers, but not for fathers. Therapists should be mindful of and address the role division of labor plays in a family. Researchers should examine the use of a more comprehensive overview of division of labor tasks.

This study examined the relationship between self-reported childhood physical and sexual abuse, relationship quality, possible gender differences, and clinical implications. Three hundred thirty eight women and 296 men who sought services at a university mental health clinic in the northeast region of the United States completed a 30-minute self-report assessment questionnaire before their first therapy session. Among the items in the questionnaire were measures of childhood physical abuse and sexual abuse, relationship stability, problems areas in the relationship, and other demographic information. Results from structural equation modeling indicated that childhood physical abuse influenced relationship quality for both men and women while childhood sexual abuse did not have a significant impact on relationship quality for either gender. The results of the study indicate that there may be more gender similarities than differences in experiences of childhood abuse and relationship quality than previous research suggests. Clinical implications and directions for future research are discussed.

This study of married couples examined the relationship between perceptions of attachment related family-of-origin experiences and sexual satisfaction directly and when mediated by marital quality. The sample consisted of 3,953 married couples who responded to the RELATionship Evaluation (RELATE). The nested model showed that more positive overall family-of-origin experiences and parent-child relationships were related to higher sexual satisfaction. When adding marital quality as a mediator, overall family-of-origin experience and the parent-child relationship were predictive of higher sexual satisfaction when mediated by marital quality but removed most direct effects to sexual satisfaction. There was a strong positive relationship between marital quality and sexual satisfaction. No major gender differences emerged and more than 50% of the variance in sexual satisfaction was explained by the full model for both males and females. Results suggest that family-of-origin experiences play an important role in the sexual satisfaction of married couples, especially when mediated by marital quality, and should be considered in treatment, education, and research.

This study examined whether investigation of the linkages between division of labor and marital quality would produce the same results in Russia that have been found in the U.S. Russian couples (n = 172) participated in the study by answering three packets of questionnaires. The Kansas Marital Satisfaction Scale was used to measure each partner's rating of their levels of satisfaction with their marital relationship and their spouse. The results from the structural equation models indicated that the more the wives perceived themselves doing more and expressed dissatisfaction of their spouse's contribution to child care tasks and apartment maintenance, the lower were their levels of marital satisfaction. Also, the more the wives perceived themselves doing more and expressed dissatisfaction with their spouse's contribution to household chores and apartment maintenance, the lower were their husband's levels of marital satisfaction. Overall, the wives' perception of division of labor, instead of the husbands', strongly effects marital satisfaction. These findings paralleled the U.S. results of division of labor and marital quality. Clinical implications and directions for future research are discussed.

Parents of children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are at greater risk than other couples for having higher stress levels and lower marital quality. Respite care has been suggested as a way to help alleviate stress. This study investigated the relationship between respite care and marital quality; and the potential of mother stress and father stress as mediating variables. One hundred and one couples, each consisting of a mother and a father who lived with their child with an ASD, were given questionnaires including a respite questionnaire, Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale, Experience in Close Relationships Questionnaire, and Daily Hassles and Uplifts Scale. Results showed that the amount of respite care was positively related to marital quality for both husbands and wives. Husband and wife stress and husband and wife uplifts mediated the relationship between respite care and marital quality for both husbands and wives, indicating these variables of stress and uplifts were processes through which respite care had an indirect effect on marital quality. Results suggest that policy makers should develop strategies for providing respite care for families with children diagnosed with an ASD.