“A good fight with your spouse may
be good for your health,” according to a longitudinal
analysis of couples in Tecumseh, Michigan. Preliminary
findings were released by The University of Michigan at Ann
Arbor on January 22.
Further details suggest that when
both spouses suppress their anger when subjected to an
“unfair attack,” at least one of the spouses was twice as
likely to die earlier, as compared to other conflict
resolution styles.
“When couples get together, one of
their main jobs is reconciliation about conflict,” said
Ernest Harburg, professor emeritus with The University of
Michigan School of Public Health and the Psychology
Department, lead research author. “Usually nobody is trained
to do this. If they have good parents, they can imitate,
that's fine, but usually the couple is ignorant about the
process of resolving conflict. The key matter is, when the
conflict happens, how do you resolve it?”
Conversely, “When you don't, if
you bury your anger, and you brood on it and you resent the
other person or the attacker, and you don't try to resolve
the problem, then you're in trouble.”
The paper, “Marital Pair Anger
Coping Types May Act as an Entity to Affect Mortality:
Preliminary Findings from a Prospective Study (Tecumseh,
Michigan, 1971-88),” will appear in January in the Journal of
Family Communication. Co-authors are: Niko Kaciroti, Center
for Human Growth and Development; Lillian Gleiberman,
Department of Internal Medicine; M. Anthony Schork and Mara
Julius, both School of Public Health emeritus.
—posted by Dell Deaton @10:35 AM EST 1/29/2008
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