scholarly journals Support in response to a spouse’s distress: Comparing women and men in same-sex and different-sex marriages

2021 ◽  
pp. 026540752199845
Author(s):  
Mieke Beth Thomeer ◽  
Amanda M. Pollitt ◽  
Debra Umberson

Support for a spouse with psychological distress can be expressed in many different ways. Previous research indicates that support expression is shaped by gender, but we do not know much about how support within marriage is provided in response to a spouse’s distress outside of a different-sex couple context. In this study, we analyze dyadic data from 378 midlife married couples (35–65 years; N = 756 individuals) within the U.S. to examine how men and women in same- and different-sex relationships provide support when they perceive that their spouse is experiencing distress. We find women in different-sex couples are less likely to report taking care of their distressed spouse’s tasks or giving their distressed spouse more personal time and space compared to women in same-sex couples and men. We also find that men in different-sex couples are less likely to report encouraging their spouse to talk compared to men in same-sex couples and women. Being personally stressed by a spouse’s distress is positively associated with providing support to that spouse, whereas feeling that a spouse’s distress is stressful for the marriage is negatively associated with providing support. This study advances understanding of gendered provisions of support in response to psychological distress in marriage, moving beyond a framing of women as fundamentally more supportive than men to a consideration of how these dynamics may be different or similar in same- and different-sex marital contexts.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mieke Beth Thomeer ◽  
Amanda Pollitt ◽  
Debra Umberson

Accepted at the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships Abstract: Support for a spouse with psychological distress can be expressed in many different ways. Previous research indicates that support expression is shaped by gender, but we do not know much about how support within marriage is provided in response to a spouse’s distress outside of a different-sex couple context. In this study, we analyze dyadic data from 378 midlife married couples (35-65 years; N = 756 individuals) within the U.S. to examine how men and women in same- and different-sex relationships provide support when they perceive that their spouse is experiencing distress. We find women in different-sex couples are less likely to report taking care of their distressed spouse’s tasks or giving their distressed spouse more personal time and space compared to women in same-sex couples and men. We also find that men in different-sex couples are less likely to report encouraging their spouse to talk compared to men in same-sex couples and women. Being personally stressed by a spouse’s distress is positively associated with providing support to that spouse, whereas feeling that a spouse’s distress is stressful for the marriage is negatively associated with providing support. This study advances understanding of gendered provisions of support in response to psychological distress in marriage, moving beyond a framing of women as fundamentally more supportive than men to a consideration of how these dynamics may be different or similar in same- and different-sex marital contexts.


2005 ◽  
Vol 70 (4) ◽  
pp. 541-562 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael J. Rosenfeld ◽  
Byung-Soo Kim

Interracial unions and same-sex unions were rare and secretive in the past because U.S. society was organized to suppress such unions. The rise of same-sex and interracial unions in the past few decades suggests changes in the basic structure of U.S. society. Young adults have been marrying later, and single young adults are much less likely to live with their parents. The independence of young adults has reduced parental control over their children's choice of mate. Using microdata from the U.S. Census, this article shows that interracial couples and same-sex couples are more geographically mobile and more urban than same-race married couples. The authors view the geographic mobility of young couples as a proxy for their independence from communities of origin. The results show that nontraditional couples are more geographically mobile even after individual and community attributes are taken into account. Same-sex couples are more likely to be interracial than heterosexual couples, indicating that same-sex and interracial couples are part of a common fabric of family diversification. The article discusses related historical examples and trends.


Pólemos ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 271-295
Author(s):  
David Austin ◽  
Mark E. Wojcik

Abstract This article considers the status of same-sex couples whose lawful marriage in one jurisdiction may not be recognized in another, or who may face discrimination and criminal penalties for their sexual orientation. The article surveys positive developments that promote equality for sexual minorities rather than their punishment. The degree of positive change varies across countries. While traveling across borders, sexual minorities are often subjected to strange dislocations in time and space: they can accelerate through centuries of struggle to find freedom in foreign lands, or they can be hurled back into the darkness of the closet or, worse, detained in a prison cell. The article also focuses on some of the positive developments – legal and otherwise – that have led to the growth of a gay tourist industry; some of the problems that gay travelers may potentially encounter when crossing into countries where the legal rights of sexual minorities are not safeguarded; and some potential “solutions” that will allow gay travelers to engage in cross-border travel without feeling that they are being forced back into the limiting borders of the closet’s confines.


2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Behler ◽  
Rachel Donnelly ◽  
Debra Umberson

Ample work stresses the interdependence of spouses’ psychological distress and that women are more influenced by their spouse’s distress than men. Yet previous studies have focused primarily on heterosexual couples, raising questions about whether and how this gendered pattern might unfold for men and women in same-sex marriages. We analyze 10 days of diary data from a purposive sample of men and women in same-sex and different-sex marriages ( n = 756 individuals from 378 couples) to examine psychological distress transmission between spouses and how this process may differ for men and women in same-sex and different-sex marriages. We find that women are more strongly influenced by their partners’ distress than men, regardless of whether they are married to a man or a woman, and that this relationship is particularly strong for women with male spouses.


Author(s):  
Gillian Frank ◽  
Bethany Moreton ◽  
Heather R. White

The lines seem so clearly drawn: A white evangelical minister stands in front of his California congregation on a Sunday morning. In one hand he holds a Bible. In the other is the text of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges extending civil marriage rights to same-sex couples throughout the country. “It’s time to choose,” he thunders to thousands of believers in the stadium-style worship center. “Will we follow the Word of God or the tyrannical dictates of government?” His declaration “This is who I stand with” is met with applause from the faithful as he dramatically flings the Court’s decision to the ground and tramples on it, waving the Bible in his upraised hand....


2020 ◽  
pp. 117-139
Author(s):  
Méadhbh McIvor

This chapter studies the use of biblically inflected speech in political debate. It begins by examining the arguments raised by conservative Christian activists in their campaign to prevent the passage of the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) Act 2013. Introducing the concept of 'communicative doubt', the chapter argues that there is a sense in which neither 'religious' nor 'secular' arguments are thought to be an appropriate means of conveying Biblical Truth to those who are not (yet) Christian, for what is needed is the intervention of a speaking God. It then explores this doubt as it manifested in the lives of two Christ Church members who had been involved in one of the Christian Legal Centre's earliest cases. Five years on, they remained unsure of whether or not it communicated the Good News they had hoped to share. These doubts, hesitations, and ambivalences speak to the contested place of public Christianity in contemporary England, and to the difficulties faced by those who insist that their faith must go public: the challenge of rendering Christianity legible not only to law and politics, but to the individual men and women who are subject to these worldly institutions.


2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 114-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey E. Stokes

Loneliness is not merely an unpleasant experience but is harmful for older adults’ health and well-being as well. While marriage buffers against loneliness in later life, even married adults experience loneliness, and aspects of adults’ marriages may either protect against or actually foster loneliness among spouses. The current study analyzed dyadic data from 1,114 opposite-sex married Irish couples who participated in the initial wave of The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (2009–2011) in order to extend findings of two prior dyadic studies of marital quality and loneliness in the U.S. to older married couples in Ireland and to directly compare two theoretical and methodological frameworks used by these studies to explain associations between husbands’ and wives’ reports of marital quality and loneliness in later life. Results revealed that both spouses’ perceptions of positive and negative marital quality were significantly related with husbands’ and wives’ loneliness and that spouses’ reports of loneliness were significantly related with one another. Findings also indicated that associations between marital quality and loneliness were similar for Irish and American couples in later life. Comparison of differing modeling strategies suggested that emotional contagion may serve as a pathway for dyadic partner effects.


2008 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-116 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly F. Balsam ◽  
Theodore P. Beauchaine ◽  
Esther D. Rothblum ◽  
Sondra E. Solomon

2002 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-86
Author(s):  
Timothy F. Murphy

For many commentators in bioethics and the law, safety is the fulcrum for evaluating the ethics of human reproductive cloning. Carson Strong has argued that if cloning were effective and safe it should be available to married couples who have tried to have children through various assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) but been unable to do so. On his view, cloning should be available only as reproductive last resort. I challenged that limited use by trying to show that the arguments Strong adduces in favor of reproductive somatic nuclear transfer (SNT) for married couples extend to same-sex couples as well, who face a different kind of infertility. I also went on to argue that his justifications would in fact extend the legitimate use of SNT to any couples regardless of whether they had fertility difficulties or not.


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