Effects of a Couple Communication Program on Marital Adjustment

Abstract

Background: Couples are usually advised to improve their communication skills to increase harmony and avoid conflicts. However, studies aimed at increasing marital adjustment in primary care are limited.Methods: A Couple Communication Program was announced at the Ondokuz Mayis University Permanent Education Center, and the Dyadic Adjustment Scale was administered to 67 couples who volunteered. Twenty-eight persons (14 couples) with the lowest test scores were randomized into study and control groups. At the end of the program (post-test), the scale was again administered to the study group. Afterward, the pretest and post-test scores of the study and control groups were compared. The study group's pretest, post-test, and follow-up test scores were also examined.Results: No difference in marital adjustment was found between the study and control groups before the start of the program (P > .05). The post-test scores of the couples attending the Couple Communication Program proved to be higher in total than the scores of those who did not attend (P < .001). The post-test and follow-up scores of the study group were significantly higher than their pretest scores (P < .001). There was no significant difference between the post-test and follow-up scores of the study group (P ‫؍‬ 1.0). Conclusion

The Effectiveness of Communication Skills Training on Marital Conflicts and its Different Aspects in Women

“…These results, also, confirmed the second hypothesis which is in agreement with different studies (Buttler &, Wampler, 1999;Schilling, et al, 2003;Halford et al, 2001;Hosseinian, 2005;Yalcin, & Karahan, 2007). Cooperation, here, means the inclination of each spouse to attend to the other's opinions, to come to a common conclusion on different issues and to avoid disagreeing and illogical refusal of spouse's opinions.…”

“…This is in agreement with the findings of Schilling, et al (2003) ; Halford et al (2001) ;Gottman, (2004) ;Hosseinian, (2005);Nazari & Navabinejad, (2006), Yalcin, & Karahan, (2007); Khojaste Mehr, (2008) studies. It seems that the communication skills training had strongly influenced the marital conflicts in women.…”

Comparison the Effects of Communication and Conflict Resolution Skills Training on Marital Satisfaction

“…Couple communication and marriage improvement programs as well as results from previous studies on the positive effects of marital satisfaction also support the findings of this study. Most of the previous studies depended on post-test score after group therapy to determine behavioral modification (Yalcin and Karahan, 2007). The present research, which is experimental, differs from previous studies as it examines the relationship between communication skills and marital satisfaction.…”

“…The present research, which is experimental, differs from previous studies as it examines the relationship between communication skills and marital satisfaction. The main focus of past studies has been on the relationship of communication skills and marital satisfaction Litzinger and Gordon, 2005;Yalcin and Karahan, 2007). This present study adds to and complements the existing body of research with its examination of the effects of communication skills training as well as conflict resolution among Iranian couples.…”

The Couples' Illness Communication Scale (CICS): Development and evaluation of a brief measure assessing illness‐related couple communication

“…Higher scores are indicative of worse marital adjustment. Since communication is an important aspect of marital satisfaction, and this scale has demonstrated sensitivity to changes in couple communication (Yalcin & Karahan, 2007) this scale was expected to be highly correlated with the CICS. This scale was used to determine convergent validity.…”