Moods, Stressors, and Severity of Marital Conflict: A Daily Diary Study of Low‐Income Families

• Author: Meghan P. McCormick,Patricia Chou,E. Mark Cummings,JoAnn Hsueh,Christine Merrilees
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12258
• Published date: 01 July 2017
• Date: 01 July 2017

M P. MC  JA H MDRC

C M State University of New York– Geneseo

P C Research Alliance for New York City Schools

E. M C University of Notre Dame

Moods, Stressors, and Severity of Marital Conict:

A Daily Diary Study of Low-Income Families

Objective: To examine links between nega-

tive moods, stressors, and daily marital con-

ict, and to test whether participation in a

family-strengthening program moderates those

associations.

Background: Some family-strengthening inter-

ventions have shown positive effects on low-

income married couples’ relationships. Yetlittle

is known about how these programs inuence

low-income families’ daily functioning.

Method: Families randomly assigned to the

program participated in 10 weeks of relation-

ship education. Control group families received

no services. Thirty months later, participants

reported on the severity of marital conicts over

a 15-day period, as well as their moods and

stressors.

Results: Dyadic models demonstrated that al-

though moods like anger, anxiety, stress, and

sadness were associated with more severemari-

tal disagreements, associations were less strong

for wives assigned to the program than to the

control group. Although stress related to money

was associated with more severe disagreements

for husbands, associations were weaker for

MDRC, 16 East 34th St., 19th Floor, New York, NY 10016

(meghan.mccormick@mdrc.org).

Key Words: Conict, diary, intervention, low-income,

negative moods.

husbands assigned to the program than for

those to the control group.

Conclusion: Family-strengthening interventi-

ons may be able to reduce the tendency for

negative moods and stressors to manifest in

more severe marital conict.

Implications: Programs may benet from exp-

licitly addressing the moods and stressors that

individual husbands and wives report experienc-

ing in their daily lives.

B

Marital conict is one of the most studied aspects

of marital relationships (Gottman, 2014), likely

because of marital conict’s association with a

host of negative outcomes for couples and fami-

lies, including depression, substance abuse, and

divorce in adults, and behavioral problems in

children (Sears, Repetti, Reynolds, Robles, &

Krull, 2016). Although most work on marital

conict has focused on middle-class White fami-

lies, low-income and racial/ethnic minority fam-

ilies may be at higher risk for experiencing more

conictual home environments (Jackson et al.,

2016).

In response, family-strengthening interven-

tions specically designed for low-income

married couples have been developed to support

families in creating healthy environments for

their children, where conicts are constructive

Family Relations 66 (July 2017): 425–440 425

DOI:10.1111/fare.12258

426 Family Relations

rather than destructive (Hawkins & Erick-

son, 2015). However, there is currently some

controversy in the eld over whether these

programs can improve low-income couples’

relationship quality. Although some programs

have demonstrated sizable positive effects on

couple outcomes (Hawkins, Blanchard, Bald-

win, & Fawcett, 2008), recent evaluations

of family-strengthening interventions tested

outside of laboratory conditions and with

low-income married couples have had smaller

effects on outcomes such as relationship quality

and communication (Hsueh et al., 2012). In typ-

ical randomized trials of family-strengthening

interventions, surveys and videotaped obser-

vations are used to assess program impacts at

follow-up points. Assessing discrete points in

time provides only a brief snapshot of marital

functioning and may mask more nuanced under-

standing of how low-income families engage in

marital conict in their day-to-day lives and how

participation in a family strengthening program

inuences that daily functioning. The present

study addresses these important gaps in the

literature and uses an embedded diary study to

describe low-income and racially and ethnically

diverse families’ daily marital conict, nega-

tive moods, and stressors. The study then tests

whether participation in a family strengthening

program may have attenuated links between

negative moods and stressors and severity of

marital conict in this sample of families.

Literature Review

Researchers have argued that it is not whether

couples experience conict but rather the nature

and severity of conicts, and whether disagree-

ments are resolved, that predicts adult and child

well-being (Cummings & Davies, 2011; Notar-

ius & Markman, 1993). Destructive or misman-

aged marital conict, characterized by verbal

and nonverbal hostility and negative emotional-

ity, is associated with negative behaviors (Cum-

mings & Davies, 2011; Rinaldi & Howe, 2003).

In contrast, constructive marital conict, char-

acterized by support, problem solving, and con-

ict resolution, is associated with positive emo-

tions and behaviors (Kinsfogel & Grych, 2004).

Given that constructive conict is associated

with improved marital quality, it may be most

important to help couples limit destructive and

severe conict rather than eliminating conicts

or disagreements (Hawkins & Erickson, 2015).

However, conict tends to be exacerbated in the

presence of stressors or negative moods (Mad-

hyastha, Hamaker, & Gottman, 2011), so daily

stressors may provoke destructive and severe

conict.

There is little empirical research sub-

stantiating these dynamic patterns in the

transmission of behaviors and emotions within

low-income, racially and ethnically diverse

families. Low-income couples are about twice

as likely to break up or divorce relative to more

afuent families (Bramlett & Mosher, 2002). In

the face of economic hardships, couples may be

even more likely to experience severe marital

conicts (Hawkins & Erickson, 2015). When

many demands and stressors are evident, and

there are few sources of support, as is more

likely for low-income couples (Trail & Karney,

2012), spouses may have a diminished ability

to exercise coping skills when severe conicts

occur (Karney, Story & Bradbury, 2005). One

would expect that low-income married couples

might experience greater transmission of neg-

ative behaviors, emotionality, and affect in the

context of marital conict. When one spouse

displays negative behaviors or affect, it may

be more likely to be reciprocated by the other

spouse and manifest itself in a severe conict

(Mitchell, Eby, & Lorys, 2015; Sears et al.,

2016).

According to the sensitization hypothesis,

which is empirically supported by extensive

research on individual responses to repeated

exposure to destructive conict (Cummings &

Davies, 2011), heightened negative emotions

and behaviors during conict sensitize couples

to conict. Consequently, couples are posited

to be more reactive to conict as a result of

repeated exposure to conict. Furthermore,

emotional security theory (EST; Cummings

& Davies, 2011) provides a theoretical model

to account for sensitization. According to

EST, repeated exposure to destructive conict

increases emotional insecurity in relationships,

motivating greater emotional and behavioral

reactivity in response to the greater perceived

threat associated with heightened emotional

insecurity. Following EST, couples may also be

more vulnerable to mismanaged and destructive

conict in the face of stressors outside of the

marriage (Jackson et al., 2016). Even so, links

between stressors, moods, and conict remain

unexplored among low-income, racially and

ethnically diverse families.