The Supporting Healthy Marriage Evaluation: Early Impacts on Low-Income Families

Does Couples' Communication Predict Marital Satisfaction, or Does Marital Satisfaction Predict Communication?

“…Because communication has been viewed as the key mechanism underlying relationship functioning, interventions designed to prevent or ameliorate couples' distress have emphasized communication skills (e.g., Benson, McGinn, & Christensen, ; Rogge, Cobb, Lawrence, Johnson, & Bradbury, ). In particular, this focus on decreasing negative communication and increasing positive communication forms the core agenda in large‐scale, federally sponsored tests of leading couple education programs (e.g., Hsueh et al, ; Wood, Moore, Clarkwest, & Killwald, ), following the assumption that improving couples' communication will improve relationships and, ultimately, prevent relationship dissolution. This focus is appropriate if poor communication is the root of marital distress.…”

“…Prior research on the association between communication and satisfaction is also limited by its focus on middle‐class Caucasian couples, which narrows the range of experiences captured and limits the generalizability of findings. Studying samples that are culturally and economically diverse is especially important in light of the interventions described earlier, as recent federal initiatives have sought to develop and deliver communication‐based interventions to ethnically diverse low‐income couples (Hsueh et al, ; Wood et al, ). The theoretical assumption underlying these models—that better communication yields stronger and more fulfilling relationships—has yet to be tested in these populations, however.…”

Examining Parental Alliance for Low-Income Participants Who Attended Relationship Education With or Without a Partner

“…Recent research continues to support CRE as an effective relationship intervention for low-income couples (e.g., Hawkins & Fackrell, 2010;Hsueh et al, 2012). However, it is not clear why CRE is effective.…”

Parental Preferences for Early Intervention Programming Examined Using Best–Worst Scaling Methodology

“…However, it is sobering that some studies that have specifically investigated interventions that aim to improve and engage families of young children yield modest outcomes, at best (see Avellar et al 2011;Cowan et al 2009;Hseuh et al 2012;Wadsworth et al 2010;Wood et al 2010). It is possible that the inconsistent outcomes in these large, clinical trials relate to the format, approach, and implementation strategies researchers used to engage families within intervention.…”