Tips from the Love Doc

Years ago, before psychologist John Gottman, PhD, had become one of the country's most respected marriage researchers, he was courting a woman at a seafood restaurant in Seattle. Dinner had just been served when the apple of his eye, in a grouchy mood, let loose with a nasty comment. Gottman fell to the floor, clutching his chest. From underneath the table, he moaned, "Nice shooting, partner -- you got me," a line he stole from a cowboy game he used to play in an amusement arcade. When he came up from under the table, his future wife was laughing -- and a tense moment was defused.

 

A lot of guys might have felt resentful when stung by a choice comment from a grumpy mate. Instead, Gottman used humor to de-escalate the tension that arises in every relationship. Today Gottman's insights into the nature and workings of married life are based on a lot more than just his own good instincts.

 

Gottman, you see, is a professional snoop. For 25 years, he's been spying on other people's marriages, bringing newly wed couples into his "love lab" at the University of Washington in Seattle to videotape them as they chat, argue, and fume. He measures their heart rates and blood pressure, records every smile and contemptuous curl of the lip. And when he's done, he can predict -- with 94% accuracy, he claims -- how likely a couple is to stay together.

 

And staying together is important. Three decades after the "divorce boom" of the 1970s, experts throughout the United States are giving new credence to the notion that a mediocre marriage is better than a broken one. Some, such as psychologist Judith Wallerstein, PhD, argue that divorce damages children throughout their lives, sometimes preventing them from forming solid relationships in adulthood.

 

In a controversial book released in 2000, The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25 Year Landmark Study, Wallerstein even makes the case that, from a child's point of view, all but the lousiest marriage is better than a good divorce.

 

However, another book, out in 2002, has a different point of view. In For Better or For Worse: Divorce Reconsidered, E. Mavis Hetherington, a psychology professor emeritus at the University of Virginia, and her co-author John Kelly make the argument that most kids of divorce function well with little long-term damage.

 

Gottman agrees. Divorce, he believes, hurts children mostly when parents fail to shield them from ongoing hostility and conflict. If divorcing couples cooperate in raising their children, he says, the kids can emerge relatively healthy and unscathed. Still, Gottman agrees that trying to stay together is an important goal -- and not just for the sake of the kids. After children, he says, men are the biggest beneficiaries of marriage.