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Marital Conf lict, Repair,
and Parenting
Beverly J. Wilson
Seattle Pacific University
John M. Gottman
University of Washington
Anna starts the “Hands Game” with enthusiasm and energy. She bounces up and down in her seat in
an animated manner and leans in close to her father as she tries to capture his large hands with her
own. Anna laughs loudly when she finally catches him and shouts, “Ha, I got ya!” Anna’s father appears
more tentative than Anna, smiling only slightly when she catches him. He makes few comments when she
succeeds in her attempts but continues to watch her intently, as if trying to gauge her every response. The
game continues for several more turns with Anna playing the “catcher” and her father the “catchee.”
When her father suggests that they switch roles, Anna agrees reluctantly. Her father quickly reassures
her that she can catch him again after a couple turns. She manages to elude her father’s attempts to
catch her hands for several turns but eventually he is able to capture her. As her father shouts, “I got ya
back,” she quickly pulls her hands back and up to her chest as if she has been hurt. She looks shocked
and says, “Ya . . . that’s not . . . don’t,” and averts her gaze. Her father fails to see her response at first
and continues to talk to her, stating that she will be able to get him again soon. When he finally notices
her displeasure, he tries unsuccessfully to coax her to continue the game. She whines and turns her
body away from him, drawing her leg up she kicks at him. He asks, “What’s wrong, are you tired?”
She looks angry and pulls both legs up toward her chest and sits in her chair with her arms wrapped
around her legs. She refuses to talk or look at him except for occasional glares. Her father asks, “Are ya
hungry? I’ll bet you’re hungry. Come on, we can play any game that you want. You tell me what game
you want to play and we’ll play it. Whatever you want.” Although her father clearly understands that
something is wrong, he asks about Anna’s physical state but fails to inquire or address Anna’s emotional
distress.
INTRODUCTION
Anna and her parents are participating in a study investigating the role of family interaction patterns
in children’s conduct and social problems (see Wilson, 2001, for more information). Anna’s parents
report that they are concerned about her temper, she seems to get angry easily and has few friends at
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school or in her neighborhood. They feel frustrated about how to help her. Anna ’s father states that he
does not understand her behavior and that he only wants her to be happier. Questionnaires completed
by Anna ’s mother indicate that she is unhappily married to Anna ’s father and feels very little support
from her husband in parenting Anna. When interacting in triadic family sessions, Anna ’s mother
and father have difficulty coordinating their efforts to help her complete a homework assignment
or build a world in a sandbox with toy people, animals, and buildings. There is little mutual fun or
enjoyment in their interactions; negativity and competition dominate.
Relationships within the family may be the most intimate and in fluential forces in the lives of
individuals. Theories of individual differences have failed to predict which child will be kind and
which will be aggressive, which child will enjoy learning and which will be unable to learn, which
will be happy and which will be anxious or depressed. On the other hand, family factors do predict
many of these things in the longitudinal course of a child ’s life.
Over the past 25 years numerous studies have linked processes within the family to children ’s
prosocial behavior (Heinicke, Guthrie, and Ruth, 1997; Hetherington, Cox, and Cox, 1985; Janssens
and Dekovic, 1997; Putallaz, 1987), social and cognitive competence (Brody and Flor, 1998; Long,
Forehand, Fauber, and Brody, 1987; Long, Slater, Forehand, and Fauber, 1988; O ’Connor, Caspi,
DeFries, and Plomin, 2000; Strassberg, Dodge, Bates, and Pettit, 1992), aggression (Borkhuis and
Patalano, 1997; Hetherington et al., 1985; Johnston, Gonzalez, and Campbell, 1987; Patterson, 1971,
1982; Short, 1998), conduct problems/disorders (Anderson, Greene, Hetherington, and Clingempeel,
1999; Johnson and O ’Leary, 1987; Jouriles, Murphy, and O ’Leary, 1989; Pagani, Boulerice, Tremblay,
and Vitaro, 1997; Jouriles, P fiffner, and O ’Leary, 1988; Simons, Lin, Gordon, Conger, and Lorenz,
1999), delinquency/antisocial behavior (Emery and O ’Leary, 1982; Patterson and Stouthamer-Loeber,
1984; Peterson and Zill, 1986; Short, 1998), depression (McCabe, 1997), and anxiety/withdrawal
(Johnston et al., 1987; Long et al., 1987; Patterson, 1993; Sheets, Sandler, and West, 1996).
Recent research has found especially good predictability from the quality of couples ’ marriages to
children ’s development. It is even the case that we can predict from what the marriage is like before
children arrive to what the children will be like when they are in preschool (Cowan and Cowan,
1992). The mechanisms that account for these predictions, however, are not well understood at this
point. In the following pages we attempt to link processes in marriage to child development. In
doing this we wish to explore three major themes. First, although parental con flict has typically been
associated with negative outcomes for children, we believe that it is not con flict per se that leads to
deleterious effects but a de ficit or failure in the repair of negative interactions. We will describe a
theoretical model of dynamic homeostasis, set point, feedback, and repair that will be helpful for
organizing the research we will review about families. We suggest that con flict and miscoordinations
in relationships are a normal and healthy part of family life. It is their resolution and the ultimate
proportion of positive to negative interactions that are critical.
Second, we suggest that families serve as what we will call “emotion cultures.” It is within families
that individuals learn when and how to feel and how to think about these feelings, and hence develop
a meta-emotional life. Families report a wide diversity of feelings and cognitive structures about
emotions. For example, some families think that anger in themselves and in their children is harmful
and should not be expressed, especially by children. Others think that anger is natural but ought to be
ignored. Others believe anger should be expressed and explored with the child. We have also found
that these meta-emotional cultures are emotion and gender speci fic. Fathers often have different
attitudes toward sadness expressed by sons versus daughters, for example. These emotion cultures
within families lead to different experiences for children. These experiences, in turn, have important
consequences for individuals and relationships. When two individuals come together to form a new
family, they bring these distinct attitudes, beliefs, and biases with them.
Third, we want to make two types of recommendations: One type of recommendation is for
families who must deal with a number of normative and nonnormative transitions, and a second type of
recommendation concerns public policy related to families. For this second type of recommendation
we will propose a cumulative stress model. We will review research that shows that cumulative stress
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in children ’s lives is associated with numerous child de ficits. Social policy can be developed to assist
families during transitions and restructuring.
The following sections summarize research related to the linkage between marriages and child
development. We start by discussing research on potential mechanisms for this relationship and
discuss the in fluence of marital interaction, quality, and processes related to repair of negativity.
This information is used to build a model for the regulation of negativity in families. A typology
of marriages and families based on this model is presented with a discussion of potential risks and
bene fits to children in the different types of marriages. We also discuss a number of buffers and risk
factors that may mediate the effects of marital interaction on children.
THE SEARCH FOR MECHANISMS THAT LINK MARITAL
INTERACTION AND CHILD OUTCOMES
The challenge that must be met in the area of research dealing with the transfer of marital interaction
to children is the development of theory that provides operational and testable mechanisms capable
of accounting for observed relationships. This is now quite feasible, and we suggest that the field
develop an aesthetic preference for precise theories over those that are vague and more metaphor than
mechanism. The following section summarizes research on three potential mechanisms: modeling,
cumulative stress, and parenting practices.
Modeling
Marital con flict may affect child development in a number of ways. Modeling or imitating the
aggressive behavior of others is one possible direct mechanism (Bandura, 1973; Bandura, Ross, and
Ross, 1963). Parents provide especially potent models for children because of their role as attachment
and authority figures. The salience of same-sex parents as models (Bandura, 1973; Isley, O ’Neil,
Clatfelter, and Parke, 1999) may also help to explain findings that boys are more likely to evidence
externalizing behavior and girls internalizing behavior (Block, Block, and Morrison, 1981; Emery,
1982). Research suggests that children do not need to observe actual physical aggression to evidence
an increase in these be