Impacts of healthy marriage and relationship education with integrated economic stability services

• Published date: 01 October 2023
• Author: Quinn Moore,Robert G. Wood,April Yanyuan Wu
• Date: 01 October 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12877

RESEARCH

Impacts of healthy marriage and relationship

education with integrated economic stability services

Quinn Moore

1

|Robert G. Wood

1

|April Yanyuan Wu

2

1

Mathematica, Princeton, NJ, United States

2

Mathematica, Chicago, IL, United States

Correspondence

April Yanyuan Wu, Mathematica, 111 East

Wacker Drive, Suite 3000, Chicago, IL 60601,

USA.

Email: awu@mathematica-mpr.com

Funding information

U.S. Department of Health and Human

Services, Grant/Award Number:

HHSP233201500095G

Abstract

Objective: This study evaluated the effectiveness of

Empowering Families, a healthy marriage and relationship

education (HMRE) program for low-income couples with

children supplemented with intensive employment and

financial education services.

Background: Previous research found that programs offer-

ing both HMRE and economic stability services improved

couples’relationship quality but not their economic out-

comes. Those programs did not fully integrate economic

stability and relationship education content, and take-up

rates for employment services were low.

Method: Eight hundred seventy-nine eligible couples were

randomly assigned to either (a) a program group that was

offered Empowering Families or (b) a control group that

was not offering this program. Key outcomes were mea-

sured1 yearafterstudyenrollmentthroughsurveysof

both members of the couple.

Results: Empowering Families improved all examined

aspects of couples’relationship quality (the effect size of

impacts ranges from 0.20 to 0.30); it did not affect rela-

tionship status. Empowering Families did not improve

employment outcomes, but it did reduce economic hard-

ship (the effect size of the impact is 0.13).

Conclusion: Empowering Families achieved its central

goal of strengthening couples’relationship quality. The

fact that Empowering Families reduced economic hard-

ship points to the potential value of offering financial

literacy services in conjunction with relationship

education.

Author Note: This study was supported by contract HHSP233201500095G from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,

Administration for Children and Families. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarilyreflect the views of

the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Received: 14 June 2022Revised: 22 January 2023Accepted: 4 February 2023

DOI: 10.1111/fare.12877

© 2023 National Council on Family Relations.

1422 Family Relations. 2023;72:1422–1440.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/fare

Implications: HMRE programs that offer intensive and

integrated economic stability content can improve the out-

comes of low-income couples with children.

KEYWORDS

couples, economic stability, financial literacy, healthy relationships,

marriage education, randomized controlled trial

Couples facing economic stressors such as poverty and debt can experience lower relationship

quality and stability (Dew & Yorgason, 2010; Hardie & Lucas, 2010; Lucas et al., 2020;

Williamson et al., 2013). These stressors can consume their mental energy, requiring them to

focus only on their most pressing needs (Haushofer & Fehr, 2014; Mullainathan &

Shafir, 2013). These economic stressors may limit their ability to focus on their relationships

and reduce the mental bandwidth they have available to participate in or benefit from healthy

marriage and relationship education (HMRE) programs (Hawkins et al., 2004), such as those

supported in recent decades by federal initiatives (U.S. Congress 1996,2010).

In response, researchers and policymakers have considered whether HMRE programs serv-

ing couples with low incomes would be more effective if they integrated economic stability ser-

vices designed to address these economic stressors, such as employment services designed to

help participants find a job or get a better one and financial literacy services designed to help

them manage their money (Zaveri & Dion, 2015). In recent years, the Administration for Chil-

dren and Families within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has encouraged

federally funded HMRE programs to supplement relationship education services with economic

stability services (Friend & Paulsell, 2018). The hope is that economic stability and HMRE ser-

vices will be complementary and reinforcing. Improved economic circumstances can ease stress

and thereby improve relationships. Conversely, better relationship skills and relationship qual-

ity may improve couples’ability to manage their financial situations jointly.

Research on the impact of offering integrated HMRE and economic stability services is lim-

ited, with evidence just beginning to emerge. This study helps build the evidence base by exam-

ining the Empowering Families program, an HMRE program that offered intensive and

integrated employment services and financial education to couples with low incomes that are

raising children together.

PREVIOUS RESEARCH

There is a large literature on the effectiveness of HMRE services with multiple rigorous studies

using either random assignment or matched comparison group designs having examined the

effects of offering HMRE services to couples with low incomes (Stanley et al., 2020). A recent

meta-analysis of this research has found that, overall, these programs have had modest, positive

effects on relationship skills and quality, with average effect sizes ranging from 0.11 to 0.13

(Arnold & Beelman, 2019; Hawkins et al., 2022). The programs have also typically been found

to have little or no effect on co-parenting, family stability, or other outcomes. Programs serving

primarily couples who were unmarried, Black or Hispanic, or had incomes below poverty have

generally had smaller effects (Arnold & Beelman, 2019). These relatively modest effects, partic-

ularly among the most disadvantaged couples served by these programs, have led some to point

to the need for more comprehensive approaches to family strengthening programs, including

approaches to address employment instability and material hardship in addition to relationship

education (Lee et al., 2022; Wood et al., 2014).

HMRE WITH INTEGRATED ECONOMIC STABILITY SERVICES1423