If He Is in Shape, So Is the Marriage: Perceptions of Physical Fitness and Exercise and Older Couples’ Marital Functioning

The current study explored concordance in spouses’ perceptions about exercise and how these perceptions predicted observed and self-reported marital functioning using a sample of 64 older married couples. Although couples were similarly motivated to exercise, their views on their physical fitness and potential barriers to exercise were uncorrelated. Dyadic analyses suggested that spouses’ exercise perceptions, particularly husbands’, were associated with how spouses treated each other during a marital problem-solving task and with their concurrent and future marital satisfaction. Exploring how spouses’ views of exercise are related to their marital functioning and for whom these links are most salient may highlight potential opportunities and challenges for those wishing to strengthen couples’ individual and relational well-being through exercise.

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When 2 is Better Than 1 + 1

European Psychologist ◽

10.1027/1016-9040/a000024 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 16 (4) ◽

pp. 288-294 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Melanie Peter-Wight ◽

Mike Martin

Keyword(s):

Problem Solving ◽

Spatial Memory ◽

Married Couples ◽

Individual Performance ◽

Collaborative Problem Solving ◽

Control Group ◽

Older Individuals ◽

Older Couples ◽

Problem Solving Skills ◽

Problem Solving Task

Little is known about older spousal dyads’ collaborative problem solving. Although typically collaborating dyads perform worse than nominal dyads in other dyadic cognition tasks, we assumed that older couples might profit from collaboration in a highly demanding problem-solving task requiring the sequential and complementary use of spatial memory and reasoning abilities. In this paper, we examine whether older couples profit from the dyadic situation on a computer-based problem-solving task that can most likely be optimally solved when dyads manage to distribute responsibilities between the spatial memory demands and the reasoning demands of the task. In 50 married couples consisting of N = 100 older individuals (M = 67.3 years, SD = 4.9), we tested the hypothesis that compared to their own individual performance, compared to repeated individual performance of a control group (N = 41, M = 66.0 years, SD = 3.8), and compared to nominal pairs (same 100 participants as in the experimental group), older couples would show the best performance on the task. The comparison of individual versus dyadic problem-solving performance demonstrates that dyads consisting of old spouses outperform old individuals as well as nominal pairs on the problem-solving task. Our results suggest that older familiar dyads are expert collaborators whose collaborative expertise might be able to overcome individual deficits in problem-solving skills through dyadic cognition.

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Does it matter whether we or I talk about us? Distinguishing we-talk in couples’ conflict discussions and partners’ private thoughts before and after conflict

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships ◽

10.1177/02654075211051116 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 026540752110511

Author(s):

Stephanie J Wilson ◽

Lisa M Jaremka ◽

Christopher P Fagundes ◽

Rebecca Andridge ◽

Janice K Kiecolt-Glaser

Keyword(s):

Married Couples ◽

Well Being ◽

Person Plural ◽

Word Use ◽

Emotion Word ◽

Post Conflict ◽

Before And After ◽

Marital Problem ◽

First Person Plural ◽

The Stability

According to extensive evidence, we-talk—couples’ use of first-person, plural pronouns—predicts better relationship quality and well-being. However, prior work has not distinguished we-talk by its context, which varies widely across studies. Also, little is known about we-talk’s consistency over time. To assess the stability and correlates of we-talk in private versus conversational contexts, 43 married couples’ language was captured during a marital problem discussion and in each partner’s privately recorded thoughts before and after conflict. Participants were asked to describe any current thoughts and feelings in the baseline thought-listing and to focus on their reaction to the conflict itself in the post-conflict sample. Couples repeated this protocol at a second study visit, approximately 1 month later. We-talk in baseline and post-conflict thought-listings was largely uncorrelated with we-talk during conflict discussions, but each form of we-talk was consistent between the two study visits. Their correlates were also distinct: more we-talk during conflict was associated with less hostility during conflict, whereas more baseline we-talk predicted greater closeness in both partners, as well as lower vocally encoded arousal and more positive emotion word use in partners after conflict. These novel data reveal that we-talk can be meaningfully distinguished by its context—whether language is sampled from private thoughts or marital discussions, and whether the study procedure requests relationship talk. Taken together, these variants of we-talk may have unique implications for relationship function and well-being.

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The Story of Us: Older and Younger Couples’ Language and Emotional Responses to Jointly Told Relationship Narratives

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.1854 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 562-563

Author(s):

Stephanie Wilson ◽

William Malarkey ◽

Janice Kiecolt-Glaser

Keyword(s):

Age Differences ◽

Marital Conflict ◽

Marital Quality ◽

Negative Mood ◽

Emotional Responses ◽

Married Couples ◽

Well Being ◽

Older Couples ◽

Word Use ◽

Emotion Word

Abstract Social-emotional well-being is said to improve with age, but evidence for age differences in couples’ behavior and emotions—studied primarily during marital conflict—has been mixed. Characteristics of jointly told relationship stories predict marital quality among newlyweds and long-married couples alike, yet younger and older couples’ accounts have never been compared. To examine age differences in couples’ emotional responses and in their I/we-talk, emotion word use, and immediacy (i.e., self-focused, present-tense style), 42 married couples ages 22–77 recounted their relationship’s history then rated the discussion and their moods. Compared to younger couples, older couples used more we than I language, more positive than negative words, and less immediacy. Partners in older pairs shared more similar language patterns. In turn, lower immediacy mediated links between older age and less negative mood, and explained husbands’ more positive appraisals. Indeed, relationship accounts reveal novel insights into age differences in marriage and well-being.

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Late-Midlife and Older Couples' Shared Possible Selves and Psychological Well-being During Times of Illness: The Role of Collaborative Problem Solving

The Journals of Gerontology Series B ◽

10.1093/geronb/gbq030 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 65B (4) ◽

pp. 416-424 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

I. Schindler ◽

C. A. Berg ◽

J. M. Butler ◽

K. T. Fortenberry ◽

D. J. Wiebe

Keyword(s):

Problem Solving ◽

Possible Selves ◽

Well Being ◽

Collaborative Problem Solving ◽

Older Couples ◽

Psychological Well Being ◽

Collaborative Problem ◽

Late Midlife

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Better to Forgive or to Forget? Marital Transgressions and Forgiveness in Older Couples

Journal of Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences ◽

10.5590/jsbhs.2021.15.1.20 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 15 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Jakob Jensen ◽

Amy Rauer ◽

Amanda Johnson

Keyword(s):

Potential Role ◽

Married Couples ◽

Marital Functioning ◽

Older Couples ◽

Older Adulthood ◽

Time Points ◽

Age Range ◽

Financial Issues ◽

Critical Process

Navigating romantic transgressions in older adulthood is imperative for both relationship quality and longevity, making forgiveness a critical process. The current study examined marital transgressions and forgiveness among 64 older (age range = 56–89), higher-functioning, primarily White, married couples studied at two time points spaced 16.4 months apart. More than half the spouses did not report a transgression in the past year, and not doing so was associated with better marital functioning at both time points. Of the transgressions reported, thematic analyses revealed they fell into six categories (e.g., spouse behaving badly, financial issues), but were overall relatively minor in nature. If husbands engaged in greater avoidance after a transgression, both spouses were less maritally satisfied a year later. Findings suggest more attention to not only forgiveness approaches employed (avoidance of the issue versus avoidance of the person) but also to the potential role of gender and timing in these associations.

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Scientific Problem Solving in a Virtual Laboratory: A Comparison Between Individuals and Pairs

Swiss Journal of Psychology ◽

10.1024/1421-0185.67.2.71 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 67 (2) ◽

pp. 71-83 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Yolanda A. Métrailler ◽

Ester Reijnen ◽

Cornelia Kneser ◽

Klaus Opwis

Keyword(s):

Visual Search ◽

Problem Solving ◽

Process Data ◽

Scientific Problem ◽

Domain Specific ◽

Scientific Problem Solving ◽

Before And After ◽

Verbal Data ◽

Psychological Knowledge ◽

Problem Solving Task

This study compared individuals with pairs in a scientific problem-solving task. Participants interacted with a virtual psychological laboratory called Virtue to reason about a visual search theory. To this end, they created hypotheses, designed experiments, and analyzed and interpreted the results of their experiments in order to discover which of five possible factors affected the visual search process. Before and after their interaction with Virtue, participants took a test measuring theoretical and methodological knowledge. In addition, process data reflecting participants’ experimental activities and verbal data were collected. The results showed a significant but equal increase in knowledge for both groups. We found differences between individuals and pairs in the evaluation of hypotheses in the process data, and in descriptive and explanatory statements in the verbal data. Interacting with Virtue helped all students improve their domain-specific and domain-general psychological knowledge.

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Moving to Solution

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000213 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 60 (6) ◽

pp. 403-409 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

K. Werner ◽

M. Raab

Keyword(s):

Problem Solving ◽

Embodied Cognition ◽

Cognitive Functions ◽

Problem Space ◽

Arm Swing ◽

String Problem ◽

Problem Solving Process ◽

Problem Solving Task ◽

Bodily Movements

Embodied cognition theories suggest a link between bodily movements and cognitive functions. Given such a link, it is assumed that movement influences the two main stages of problem solving: creating a problem space and creating solutions. This study explores how specific the link between bodily movements and the problem-solving process is. Seventy-two participants were tested with variations of the two-string problem (Experiment 1) and the water-jar problem (Experiment 2), allowing for two possible solutions. In Experiment 1 participants were primed with arm-swing movements (swing group) and step movements on a chair (step group). In Experiment 2 participants sat in front of three jars with glass marbles and had to sort these marbles from the outer jars to the middle one (plus group) or vice versa (minus group). Results showed more swing-like solutions in the swing group and more step-like solutions in the step group, and more addition solutions in the plus group and more subtraction solutions in the minus group. This specificity of the connection between movement and problem-solving task will allow further experiments to investigate how bodily movements influence the stages of problem solving.

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