Can Divorce Be Prevented by Enhancing the Coping Skills of Couples?

Abstract

Divorce has become the end result of many modern marriages. In Western countries, 30-50% of all marriages end in divorce, causing much pain for the concerned partners and the children involved. While this development has been apparent in the United States for quite some time, similar divorce rates are now being seen in most of the industrialized countries in Europe as well. Despite this fact, many studies show that marriage is still very popular and that most people wish to marry during the course of their life. How, then, can couples be helped to experience a more satisfying relationship and to establish higher stability in their marriage? Several longitudinal studies offer an answer to this question. It has been shown that couples who are well equipped with certain competencies such as communication skills, problem-solving abilities and coping strategies are less likely to experience a negative evolution of their marriage and are consequently less likely to divorce. It has thus been argued that preventing divorce may be possible by teaching couples such competencies at a relatively early stage in their relationship. While several preventive trainings for couples already exist, the training proposed in this article is new in that it primarily focuses on the coping skills of the couple. Research has shown that stress is an eminent enemy of close relationships and that it has the power to gradually destroy relationships over a long period of time on an unconscious level. In this article, we propose possibilities concerning how couples faced with stress can improve their coping skills and thereby strengthen their relationship.