Educate and Empower: An Online Intervention to Improve College Women’s Knowledge and Confidence When Communicating in a Romantic Relationship

Abstract

Women provide the vast majority of unpaid family work, with deleterious associated outcomes including lost jobs, increased poverty, relationship dissatisfaction, and mental health concerns. Women’s unequal share of family work increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, and their mental health concerns were exacerbated. To prevent struggles with mental health and promote healthy communication and equal family work distribution, the PARTNERS communication model and an innovative online video intervention were created to teach college women about the importance of equitable family work distribution and healthy communication. Findings from this study suggested the PARTNERS intervention was effective in educating 303 undergraduate women about family work distribution, couple communication, and a model of effective communication, and improving college women’s confidence communicating with a romantic partner. Should these findings be replicated, the PARTNERS intervention may serve as a fiscally sustainable prevention model for future widespread service delivery to educate college women about family work distribution and effective communication and improve their confidence communicating with a romantic partner. Ultimately, this intervention may serve as a mechanism for social justice by contributing to the equalization of family work distribution, thus improving women’s relationship satisfaction and mental health.

Keywords:

• family work distribution
• college women
• romantic relationships
• couple communication
• confidence

Acknowledgments

The authors express gratitude to Rachael Peters and Cara Raderman for assistance with coding of the qualitative data. They have followed the APA Ethical Principles in conducting their research and treating their participants including obtaining approval from the University of Maryland IRB [1766456-4] and receiving informed consent from all participants.

Authors’ Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design.

Disclosure Statement

The authors have no financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

Data Availability Statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

Additional information

Funding

Funding was received from the University of Maryland Center for Undergraduate Research Maryland Summer Scholars Grant, the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences Student Experience Award, and the University of Maryland Library Award for Undergraduate Research.