Couples’ Anger Dynamics during Conflict: Interpersonal Anger Regulation, Relationship Satisfaction, and Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract

We tested hypotheses about moment‐to‐moment interpersonal influences on anger during couples’ conflict, and the association of those anger dynamics with relationship satisfaction and intimate partner violence (IPV). Displayed anger was coded from laboratory observations of cohabiting couples (N = 197); experienced anger was assessed via a video‐recall procedure. Credible, but variable, associations were found in which a person’s anger display at one moment was linked to change in the partner’s anger display and experience in the next moment. Women’s anger experience was more strongly influenced by men’s anger displays in couples with higher levels of IPV and couples with lower levels of relationship satisfaction. The displayed anger of men who perpetrated higher levels of IPV was more strongly influenced by women’s anger displays. Overall, when individuals displayed higher intensity anger, partners reacted with increasingly angry feelings but decreasingly angry displays. Results suggest that anger dynamics relate to dyadic processes and that dynamics relate to important relationship outcomes. Dyadic anger dynamics might prove a worthy intervention target.

The role of intimate partner violence and relationship satisfaction in couples’ interpersonal emotional arousal.

“…Importantly, there are two interpretive possibilities for why men do not decrease in arousal. On the one hand, in light of previous findings (e.g., Jacobson et al, 1994;Slep et al, 2021), men in relationships with more extensive IPV may lack, or struggle to access, the skills needed to interact in ways that bring their emotional arousal to a lower level. In the face of such communication, partners often cannot optimally solve problems, contain their arousal, or perform the tasks needed to negotiate difficult interpersonal situations (Fruzzetti & Worrall, 2010).…”

“…Participants were taken from a larger study of couples’ interaction (Heyman et al, 2021; Slep et al, 2021). Participants were recruited via random digit dialing (Slep et al, 2006) and were English-speaking, mixed-gender couples who were living together for at least 1 year or were married.…”

“…Understanding the nuanced expression of emotional arousal in partners reporting physical and/or psychological IPV can provide further clarification on how emotional dysregulation might occur within couples’ conversations. Importantly, one other investigation using the same sample as the current paper has examined emotions between partners in relationships marked by IPV (Slep et al, 2021); specifically, this paper focused on partners’ nonverbal and paraverbal anger expression coded by trained observers, along with self-reported anger experience. Focusing on vocally encoded arousal will add to this work by elaborating on emotional processes that are not limited to a single emotion.…”

Relationship Dynamics and Abusive Interactions in a National Sample of Youth and Young Adults

“…Significant exogenous correlations may help distinguish relationship dynamics not visible outside of the dyad. For example, while the association of anger with Healthy RDs classification (compared to Intense RDs ) is not intuitive, expressions of anger (in contrast to suppression) may have functional value if strategically appraised in a given conflict by partners with the capacity for modulated responses (Slep et al, 2021). This capacity for self-awareness, emotional regulation, and skilled responses is itself a function of complex familial histories and interpersonal interactions (Milojevich & Haskett, 2018).…”

Evaluation of the ways of coping with stress and the personality traits in women exposed to violence: A comparative study

“…The women react to the violence with responses such as emotional avoidance, impulsivity, aggression, helplessness, anger, anxiety, sleep disorders, eating problems, and committing suicide. Sometimes, the women use some of these behavioral and emotional responses as the coping mechanism and, in this manner, they take measures to reduce violence-related stress and its effects (Slep et al, 2021).…”