How to Make a Marriage Last

Oct. 6, 2010 — -- Each partner in a marriage brings along personal baggage, and it doesn't require bitter conflict to destroy the relationship. Equally important, according to new research out of the University of Michigan, is how each partner deals with that conflict.

Researchers at the university interviewed 373 couples four times over a 16-year period, and found that many of those marriages were probably doomed from the beginning because the partners couldn't get their act together. One wanted to resolve the conflict. The other wanted to ignore it.

That may not be surprising, but the details are. The study, published in the current issue of the Journal of Marriage and Family, reached several conclusions, including these:

"The most important finding is the pattern of behaviors predicts the longevity of the marriage," Kira Birditt, first author of the study, said in a telephone interview. "You can't just have one person using constructive strategies, trying to find solutions and calmly discussing the problem. You have to have both spouses using that strategy."

Literally thousands of studies have tried to explain why so many marriages fail, and most have dealt with life-changing events like illness, money worries, infidelity, drug abuse and so on. But most are short-term projects because it's costly and difficult to follow marriages over the long term.