Content Themes in Marital Conversations

Abstract

Conversational themes can be viewed as a form of metacommunication about relationships. We suggest that the prominent themes in the conversations of spouses identify factors assumed to h a w an important effect on the relationship. Further, different ways of looking a t marriage are reflected in the use ofparticular content themes. A typology of content themes was deriwd from transcripts of conversations and the typology was used to code the discussions of married couples. The content themes of different marital types (i.e., traditional, separate, and independent) and more and less satisfied spouses were compared. As expected, traditional couples emphasized communal themes, such as togetherness, and separate couples emphasized individualistic themes, such as personality and separateness. Although the effects of marital satisfaction were not consistent, satisfaction tended to be positively associated with communal and impersonal themes and negatively associated with indiuidual themes. Generally, the results confirmed predicted relationships between content themes and selfreports about the marriage. casual look at the research on interpersonal communication would reveal that this literature has been more concerned A with how people communicate than with what they say. The emphasis of stylistic and structural aspects of conversation over message content reflects a widely held theoretical belief that pragmatic Alan L. Sillars (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1980) is assistant professor of interpersonal communication at the University of Montana, Missoula. Judith Weisberg (M.A., Bradley University, 1%7), Cynthia S. BurWaf (M.A., Ohio State University, 1985) and Elizabeth A. Wilson (M.A., Colorado State University, 1972) are doctoral

We can work it out: Age differences in relational pronouns, physiology, and behavior in marital conflict.

“…Specifically, content coding has shown that satisfied couples emphasize communal themes both in couples’ conversations (Sillars, Weisberg, Burggraf, & Wilson, 1987; Sillars, Burggraf, Yost, & Zietlow, 1992) and in couples’ free-response relationship descriptions (Fletcher, Fincham, Cramer, & Heron, 1987). Further, in the Buehlman and Gottman work (Buehlman et al, 1992; Carrere, Buehlman, Gottman, Coan, & Ruckstuhl, 2000), relational schemas were derived from narrative coding of videotaped oral history interviews of married couples.…”

Relational characteristics of language: Elaboration and differentiation in marital conversations

“…For example, Veroff, Sutherland, Chadiha, and Ortega (1993) found that a "we" orientation in the joint narratives of newlywed couples predicted later marital satisfaction and stability. Sillars and colleagues (Sillars, Weisberg, Burggraf, & Wilson, 1987;Sillars, Burggraf, Yost, & Zietlow, 1992) observed more communal themes (i.e., statements about shared relationship characteristics) in the conversations of satisfied couples and more individual themes (i.e., statements about separate identities or roles) in the conversations of dissatisfied couples.…”

Implicit Theories of Marriage and Evaluations of Marriage on Television

“…For example, Sillars, Pike, Jones, and Redmon (1983) found that marital satisfaction was higher when communication behaviors were consistent with couples' self-expressed marital ideologies. Similarly, other researchers found that the types of conversational content themes associated with marital satisfaction were contingent on couple type (Sillars, Weisberg, Burggraf, & Wilson, 1987).…”