Cognition in marriage: Current status and future challenges

Applied & Preventive Psychology 3:185-198 (1994). Cambridge University Press. Printed in the USA. Copyright © 1994 AAAPP 0962-1849/94 $5.00 + .00

Cognition in marriage: and future challenges

Current status

FRANK D. FINCHAM

University of Illinois

Abstract

Research on cognition in marriage is examined by posing two questions. The first asks what has been learned about marital distress from research on cognitive variables. It is addressed by examining data on (a) associations between cognitive variables and marital distress, (b) artifactual explanations for such associations, and (c) the causal impact of cognitive variables on spouse satisfaction and spouse behavior. This analysis identifies the study of knowledge structures as a theme that unifies existing research and illustrates how explicit recognition of this theme can advance future inquiry. The second question asks what has been learned from research on cognitive interventions with couples and leads to a number of suggestions for maximizing the informativeness of outcome studies. It is argued that future progress requires expanding the conception of cognition that informs marital research and integrating the study of marriage with both broader efforts to understand close relationships and to understand cognition.

Key words: Attributions, Beliefs, Knowledge structures, Marital satisfaction, Marital therapy

Systematic research on marriage in psychology reflects its applied origins; clinical psychologists in the 1970s established marriage as a legitimate area of inquiry in the disci- pline and, like the broader interdisciplinary literature on marriage, focused on understanding marital satisfaction. However, unlike colleagues in other disciplines, psychologists sought to identify" the behavioral correlates of marital satisfaction in the belief that marital distress is best allevi- ated by teaching spouses new behaviors (e.g., Stuart, 1969). Two lines of related research, one on marital behaviors and the other on marital therapy outcome, document the utilit 3, of this approach (see Beach & Bauserman, 1990; Fincham, Fernandes, & Humphreys, 1993; Noller & Fitzpatrick, 1988; O'Leary & Smith, 1991; Weiss & Heyman, 1990, for reviews). However, the findings that emerge from each line of research give rise to a seeming paradox.

Research on marital behaviors has consistently emphasized the importance of cognitive variables in understanding marital satisfaction. Early on, laboratory studies showed that "the power of variables obtained by the couples coding of their own behavior to discriminate between distressed and nondistressed couples is somewhat greater than that

Preparation of this article was supported by grant MH44078 from the National Institute of Mental Health.

The author would ILke to acknowledge the very helpful comments of Steve Beach, Tom Bradbury, mad Karen Horneffer on an earlier draft of this article.

Send correspondence and reprint requests to Frank Fincham, Psychology Department, University of Illinois, 603 East Daniel, Champaign, IL 61820.

obtained by observer-coding studies" (Gottman et al., 1976, p. 22). In a similar vein, data from diary studies of daily marital behaviors produced such poor interspouse agreement (38-51%; Christensen, Sullaway, & King, 1983; El- wood & Jacobson, 1982) that their epistemological status changed from indices of partner behavior (e.g., Wills, Weiss, & Patterson, 1974) to indices of a spouse's perceptual/cognitive "biases" (Christensen et al., 1983).

In contrast, marital therapy outcome research does not support the importance accorded cognitive variables in more basic research. Cognitive interventions are no more effective than standard behavioral treatments for increasing marital satisfaction, and their addition to such treatments does not increase treatment efficacy (see Margolin & Weiss, 1978, for a possible exception). The consistent findings of the outcome studies conducted to date has led some writers to question the significance of cognitive variables for alle- viating marital distress, according them the status of "smoldering embers" in the marital therapy outcome literature (Babcock & Jacobson, 1993).

It appears then that the study of marital behaviors and of marital therapy offer conflicting views on the importance of cognitive variables for understanding marital satisfaction. This article therefore examines what has been learned from research that investigates explicitly cognition in marriage. Such work has attempted to build on what has been learned from observational studies to provide a broader theoretical framework for understanding marriage (see Bradbury &

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Fincham, 1991; Epstein & Baucom, in press, for examples of such frameworks). Because research on marital behavior focused on understanding marital satisfaction, it is not surprising that this construct is also central to research on cognition in marriage. Thus, the prominence accorded marital satisfaction in the present article reflects the attention given to this construct in the literature. It does not imply that cognition is less relevant to other important marital variables (e.g., commitment, marital stability) or that findings regarding cognition and marital satisfaction can be generalized to these variables; data are urgently needed to inform statements on these issues.

It is also noteworthy that most research on cognition in marriage focuses on the study of cognitive contents (what spouses think, the judgments they make, and so on) with limited attention to cognitive structures (how spouses represent mentally information about the partner/marriage) and cognitive processes (how spouses process or operate on information--e.g., to make judgments--and how mental representations are transformed). Attention to cognitive structures and cognitive processes necessarily extends inquiry beyond conscious cognitions that spouses can report to the study of nonconscious cognition. Such an extension leads to a broader conception of cognition and has the potential to further enhance the contribution of research on cognition in marriage.

The overall goal of this article is to facilitate applied marital research that is guided by a broader conception of cognition. Toward this end, pertinent basic research and therapy outcome research is evaluated by asking two questions: What have we learned about marital distress from research on cognitive variables? what have we learned from therapy outcome studies on cognitive interventions with couples?

Cognitive Variables and Marital Satisfaction

Clinicians of diverse theoretical orientations have long emphasized the importance of cognitive variables in marital distress (see Wile, 1981), a sentiment found in Rausch, Bar- ry, Hertel, and Swain's (1974) seminal study that helped launch research on behavior in marriage. Although cognitive structures that give meaning to behavior play an important theoretical role in that study, systematic empirical investigation of cognitive variables in marriages is a child of the last decade. 1 Other new kids on the block, as documented by the emergence of journals devoted to each, in- chide a multidisciplinary science of close relationships, the links between cognition and emotion, the interface of social

1 The last decade has witnessed a shift in the psychological literature from inquiry dominated by the study of observed, interpersonal variables in marriage to increased interest in intrapersonal variables relevant to understanding marriage. Thus, the "behavioral tradition" of research has been replaced by a "mediational tradition," which focuses on subjective factors that might mediate behavior exchanges or serve as mediators of the relation between behavior and marital satisfaction.

and clinical psychology, and cognitive science. All have influenced the zeitgeist in which research on cognitive variables in marriage has occurred but, to date, these kids have engaged largely in parallel play. Where relevant, this article therefore crosses (artificial) boundaries separating these areas in an attempt to facilitate interactive play among them.

The early developmental stage of research on cognition in marriage has one other important feature worth noting. The flurry of activity that has taken place, like that of any toddler, does not always appear to be well coordinated, giving the appearance of an overall lack of cohesion or clear direc- tion (Baucom, Epstein, Sayers, & Sher, 1989); however, incompletely developed coordination should not blind us to the coherence of component areas of development or to the developmentally appropriate, but nonadult, nature of their integration. This article therefore also attempts to provide a guide to this area of inquiry by identifying existing and emerging themes in the literature and offering a perspective that has the potential to unite much of the research. Because reviews are available elsewhere (e.g., Arias & Beach, 1987; Baucom & Epstein, 1990; Bradbury & Fincham, 1990; Ep- stein & Baucom, in press; Fincham, Bradbury, & Scott, 1990), this overview highlights prototypic studies to document the points made.

Establishing Cognitive Correlates of Marital Satisfaction Initial research attempted to documen t cognitive corre-

lates of marital distress. The apparent ease of assessing cognition using questiortfiaires resulted in an empirical literature that focuses largely on cognitive contents even though, as will be argued later, interest in these contents is driven by assumptions about cognitive structures and cognitive processing. Although a large number of self-reported cognitive contents has been correlated with marital satisfaction, systematic research resulting in a coherent body of literature has focused on a remarkably narrow range of such cognitions. This reflects, in part, the theoretical roots of the research and the limited availability of well-constructed psychometric measures. 2

In an important analysis, Doherty (1981a, 1981b) argued that when conflicts occur spouses ask two questions: "Who or what is causing the problem? .... Can we solve the problem?" He then related these two questions to attribution theory and self-efficacy theory, respectively. Although attribution studies soon dominated this domain (reflecting the generalization of an attribution theoretic perspective to applied problems in the 1980s), research on efficacy expectations was not entirely overlooked. However, the second major area of inquiry to emerge examined more general relationship beliefs that presumably give rise to efficacy expectations. These two areas, attributions and beliefs, are

2 The large literature on social exchange/interdependenee theory can be conceptualized in terms of judgments spouses make that are relevant to their marriage. Integration of such work with marital research that is avowedly "cognitive" is beyond the scope of this article.

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used to structure the following review of cognitive correlates of marital satisfaction. 3

Attributions. A large number of studies have documented an association between attributions and marital satisfaction (see Baucom & Epstein, 1990; Bradbury & Fin- cham, 1990; Fletcher & Fincham, 1991; for reviews). The attributional hypothesis investigated is that distressed spouses, relative to their nondistressed counterparts, make attributions that accentuate the impact of negative marital events and minimize the impact of positive events. This hypothesis has been supported for attributions concerning who or what caused the event (causal attributions) and who is accountable and therefore liable to sanction for the event (responsibility attributions). Thus, for example, a negative event (e.g., parmer comes home late from work) tends to be attributed in a nonbenign manner by a distressed spouse (e.g., "he only thinks about himself and his needs") and in a benign manner by a nondistressed spouse (e.g., "the traffic was unusually heavy"); the characteristics of the causal attribution (cause is located in the partner, is global or influential in other areas of the marriage, and is stable or likely to be present in the future) and of the responsibility attribution (behavior is seen to reflect selfish motivation and negative intent and to be blameworthy) offered by the distressed spouse are likely to maintain distress and vice versa.

The attribution-satisfaction association is arguably the most robust phenomenon in the marital literature--across attributional dimensions an average of 80% of relevant studies support the attribution hypothesis and no data have emerged that are directly contrary to this hypothesis (Fin- cham, Bradbury, & Scott, 1990). This is not to suggest that results obtained across measures and methodologies are identical. For example, Sabourin, Lussier, and Wright (1991), in a successful cross-cultural replication of the attribution hypothesis, found that attributions for marital diffi- culties and for hypothetical partner behaviors were only moderately correlated, with the former more often accounting for unique variance in satisfaction. They called for a standardized attribution measure to facilitate greater com-

3 Two bodies of research exist on expectancies. The first has emerged in the close relationships literature under the topic of trust. For example, in an impressive program of research, Holmes and colleagues (Holmes & Rem- pel, 1989) have shown that trust, or "expectations about what a partner is likely to provide in a relationship" (Holmes, 1991, p. 58), are related to the appraisals they make of partner behaviors, with greater trust being associated with more benign appraisals. Although associated with satisfaction, trust is not typically studied as a means toward understanding satisfaction but as an end in itself(see Kurdek, 1991, 1993b, for exceptions), and hence we know little about how phenomena related to trust relate to or influence marital satisfaction. The second body of research has emerged in developmental psychology where expectancies have been investigated in relation to marital functioning following the birth of the first child (e.g., Hackel & Ruble, 1992) and in regard to parenting more generally (see Goodnow & Collins, 1990, and Siegel, McGillicudy-DeLisi, & Goodnow, 1992, for an overview). Although the relation between marital functioning and parenting has been documented (cf. Belsky, 1990), review of parental cognition and its relation to marital satisfaction is beyond the scope of the present article.

parison of findings across studies, a possibility realized by publication of the "Relationship Attribution Measure" (Fin- cham & Bradbury, 1992). Although the relations among attributions obtained using different methodologies (e.g., thought listing, couple conversations, questionnaires) re- mains unknown, the association with satisfaction is robust.

An interesting variant of the attribution hypothesis has been less widely examined. This variant states that attributional style or consistency in attribution responses is related to marital distress. Thus, interest shifts from mean scores to variability of responses. Such variability can be viewed in two ways: consistency of responding to items assessing the same attribution dimension and consistent use of particular patterns of responses across attributional dimensions (e.g., a partner-stable-global pattern). Baucom, Sayers, and Duhe (1989) found some evidence to support the attribution style hypothesis in that (a) less variable or more consistent responses to items assessing the same attribution dimension was associated with marital distress, (b) use of fewer pat- tems of responding across attribution dimensions was associated with husbands' distress, and (c) reliance on a single pattern of responding across dimensions was related to wives' distress. Although these results are promising, Hor- neffer and Fincham (1993) were only able to replicate them in part; they found that use of theoretically derived benign and nonbenign patterns of responding across attributions dimensions were related to marital distress. It therefore re- mains to determine whether or not attribution style, conceptualized it terms of consistency of responses, exhibits as robust an association with marital satisfaction as the attribution mean scores that have typically been investigated.

Beliefs. Despite Doherty's (1981b) emphasis on efficacy expectations and consensus that reevaluation of expectations comprises "much of what occurs in good marital therapy" (O'Leary & Turkewitz, 1978, p. 247), few studies have focused specifically on expectancies. However, generalized efficacy expectations (spouse's belief that s/he can execute the behaviors needed to settle marital conflicts) have been related to increased satisfaction (e.g., Bradbury, 1990; Pret- zer, Epstein, & Fleming, 1991). Most recently, specific expectations relating to an upcoming interaction also have been related to satisfaction with distressed spouses expect- ing fewer positive and more negative partner behaviors than nondistressed spouses (e.g., Fincham, Gamier, Gano- Phillips, & Osborne, 1993; Vanzetti, Notarious, & NeeSmith, 1992).

Most research has not focused on expectations but on the relationship beliefs that presumably give rise to such expectations. This line of inquiry reflects the general influence of Ellis's (e.g., Ellis & Greiger, 1977) writings on rational- emotional therapy and, more specifically, the impact of a measure designed to investigate unrealistic relationship beliefs. Noting the importance of a spouse's irrational beliefs about him- or herself for understanding marital distress (see Ellis & Greiger, 1977), Epstein and colleagues set out to

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show that unrealistic beliefs about relationships would provide further, unique information about marital distress. Ac- cordingly, they constructed the Relationship Belief Inven- tory (RBI) to assess five types of unrealistic relationship beliefs emphasized in clinical work with couples, especially rational-emotional therapy (Disagreement is destructive, Mindreading is expected, Partners cannot change, Sexual perfectionism, and the Sexes cannot change). They showed that relationship beliefs combined with irrational beliefs about the self were better than beliefs about the self alone in predicting expectations of therapy outcome, preference for maintaining rather than terminating the relationship, and marital satisfaction (Eidelson & Epstein, 1982). The association between the RBI and satisfaction has been replicated in numerous subsequent studies (see Baucom & Epstein, 1990; Epstein & Baucom, in press).

The RBI has dominated research on marital beliefs, but questions have arisen about its utility (e.g., Emmelkamp, Krol, Sanderman, & Ruphan, 1987; Emmelkamp et al., 1988). Most importantly, the constructs assessed have been reconceptualized in terms of a recent topology of cognitive contents comprising selective attention, attributions, expectancies, assumptions, and standards (Baucom, Sayers, & Sher, 1989). Two of the subscales (Mindreading is expected, Sexual perfectionism) apparently assess standards whereas the remaining subscales comprise assumptions (Baucom & Epstein, 1990), a distinction that has received some empirical confirmation (compared to standards, assumptions co- vary more reliably with satisfaction, are endorsed more strongly, and load on separate factors; Bradbury & Fin- cham, 1993; Kurdek, 1992). The importance of standards is also indicated by Drigotas and Rusbult's (1992) reconcep- tualization of comparison level of alternatives (CL-alt from interdependence theory) as a subjective standard in their empirically supported model of dependence for predicting relationship breakup. Interestingly, because it comprises "a mismash of attitudes, expectancies, affective and behavioral reports and general beliefs" (Fletcher & Kininmonth, 1992, p. 374) that does not distinguish between beliefs about the respondent's relationship and about relationships in general, the RBI has yielded fairly cogent data to support the potential importance of a variety of cognitive contents for understanding marital satisfaction. However, research on the vari- ous distinctions outlined by Baucom et al. (1989) is needed to evaluate more fully the utility of their topology.

Couple cognitions. Although not an identifiable body of literature, there are also data on cognition as a property of couples. Investigation of similarity and complementarity of partners has long been a general theme in marital research; however, the association between marital satisfaction and spousal similarity is not limited to personality but also includes similarity on cognitive variables (e.g., in understanding of relationship relevant concepts such as love and commitment; Arias & O'Leary, 1985). Interestingly, perceived similarity in beliefs is more predictive of marital

satisfaction than actual similarity of beliefs and accounts for variance in satisfaction that is independent of the dysfunctional nature of relationship beliefs (e.g., M. E. Jones & Stanton, 1988). Perceived similarity is, however, an individual level variable, and such findings should not deflect attention from the potential utility of relationship level cognitions to predict relationship outcomes, as demonstrated in Kurdek's (1993b) recent finding that spousal discrepancies in beliefs were greater for couples headed for divorce.

It is therefore worth noting that Fitzpatrick (1990) has reconceptualized her extensively researched couple types, formed by comparing perspectives of husbands and wives on ideology, interdependence, and conflict, as reflecting cognitive representations. However, Wegner and colleagues (e.g., Wegner, Erber, & Raymond, 1991), building on theo- ries of the group mind, have perhaps developed the notion of"couple cognition" most fully in their work on transactive memory or a couple's "shared system for encoding, storing, and retrieving information" (Wegner et al., 1991, p. 923). Transactive memory phenomena are truly dyadic in that the behavior studied is not that of either spouse but of the couple as a unit. Similarly, Kenny's (Kenny & LaVoie, 1984) Social Relations Model, whereby a person's behavior can be broken down into components that can be attributed to the person, his or her partner, and the relationship with the partner, may prove to be particularly fruitful in developing this line of inquiry, as illustrated by Cook's (1993) recent analysis of locus of control beliefs in family relationships.

Research on cognition as a truly dyadic phenomenon is rare. Most frequently, researchers compute couple scores on cognitive variables using responses obtained from each spouse individually and then relate such scores to satisfaction. Although promising, it is not always clear just what such scores mean at a conceptual level. Until problems in- volved in this level of analysis are more fully discussed and a systematic, identifiable body of literature emerges, it seems most prudent to limit the present analysis to cognition defined at the intrapersonal level.

Documenting an association between cognitive variables and satisfaction raises the question of why such an association exists. Perhaps the most obvious answer is that the association is spurious--it reflects the operation of more important third variables or simply reflects the fact that the general sentiment spouses experience is reflected "in as many tests as one chooses to administer" (Weiss & Heyman, 1990, p. 92). We therefore turn to address these answers.

Establishing the Validity of Cognition-Satisfaction Associations

In examining third variable explanations for the cognition- satisfaction association, it behooves us to remember that the number of potentially relevant third variables can never be exhausted. Nonetheless, there is evidence to rule out some of the most obvious candidates known to us at the present time.


Is the cognition-satisfaction association due to the measures and methodology used to investigate it? The cognition-satisfaction association does not appear to be id- iosyncratic to specific measures or to the use of questionnaires. The large number of cognitive correlates of satisfaction (as distinct from the small number for which a systematic body of research exists), as well as the results of attempts to compare associations both across measures of different cognitive variables and across measures within specific variables (e.g., Sabourin et al., 1991), is compelling. However, the associations found might still reflect method variance in view of the heavy reliance on questionnaires. It is therefore worth noting that documentation of the cognition-satisfaction association using attributions coded from conversations (e.g., Holtzworth-Muuroe & Jacobson, 1988; Stratton et al., 1986) has the same epistemological status as the behavior-satisfaction relation that dominated the psychological literature in the 1970s. Such data rule out the idea that the association simply reflects method variance as different methods are used to assess attributions (observation) and satisfaction (self-report). More recent work relating themes from couple narratives to satisfaction (see later section entitled Narratives) is similarly compelling.

Is the cognition-satisfaction association due to depression~negative affectivity? Depression and general negative affectivity are strongly related to marital satisfaction (Beach, Sandeen, & O'Leary, 1990), suggesting that correlations found between cognitions and satisfaction may be due to these variables. Virtually all the available evidence on this issue pertains to attributions, which is perhaps not surprising given that attributions have been investigated in the initiation and maintenance of depression. It appears that attributions account for unique variance in satisfaction even when depression/negativity affectivity is statistically controlled (e.g., Fincham & Bradbury, 1993; Karney, Bradbury, Fincham, & Sullivan, 1994), when the attributions associated with depression are controlled (e.g., Horneffer & Fin- cham, 1993), and that the attributions identified in the marital literature characterize marital distress rather than clinically diagnosed depression (Fincham, Beach, & Brad- bury, 1989). In fact, Townsley, Beach, Fincham, and O'Leary (1991) found some evidence for specific effects in clinically depressed women; despressogenic cognitions (e.g., selective abstraction, catastrophizing) predicted only depression and did so independently of attributions for parmer behavior, which, in turn, predicted only marital satisfaction and did so independently of depressogenic cognitions.

Is the cognition-satisfaction association due to marital violence? A further challenge to the cognition-satisfaction association stems from the high incidence of violence among distressed couples. A recent study that examined the independent effects of distress and violence found that nonbenign attributions were associated with violence rather than marital distress (Holtzworth-Muuroe & Hutchinson, 1993). The failure to replicate this finding in three studies

conducted at different sites is troubling; attributions and satisfaction shared variance when violence was statistically controlled and were associated when violent spouses were excluded from analyses (Fincham, Bradbury, et al., 1993). Until the source of this discrepancy is uncovered it is possible that violence may account for the cognition- satisfaction association, although the weight of available evidence suggests that it unlikely to do so.

Finally, it is worth noting that in a recent study attributions accounted for unique variance in marital satisfaction independently of both depression and anger (Senchak & Leonard, 1993). What is striking is that this finding was still obtained when partner depression and anger were also en- tered into the regression equation along with socio- demographic variables.

Having identified cognitive correlates of marital distress and having attempted to rule out artifactual, third variable explanations for the association, one can still ask whether or not cognitive assessments simply index the dominant sentiment experienced by spouses and therefore represent satisfaction under a different name. The belief in this position is so strong that attempts to explain variance in marital satisfaction using self-reports have been characterized as "invalid from a scientific standpoint" (Gottman, 1990, p. 79). This concern will be addressed by examining whether or not the study of cognitive variables increases our understanding of marital satisfaction.

Establishing That the Cognition-Satisfaction Association Matters

Several recent articles accord cognition an important role in understanding marriage and thereby attempt, at a theoretical level, to demonstrate how cognitive variables increase our understanding of marital satisfaction by providing unique information that is not available from the study of observable behavior (e.g., Bradbury & Fincham, 1991; Ep- stein & Baucom, in press; Weiss, 1981). The importance of such theoretical statements should not be underestimated as the focus on behavior in marriage was accompanied by "atheoretical," descriptive research in which assumptions remained implicit. The paucity of explanatory, theoretical frameworks in the marital literature has retarded progress in research and clinical practice. Notwithstanding the practical utility of good theory, the viability of a theoretical statement is determined ultimately by data. Research relevant to evaluating existing theoretical frameworks can be summarized in terms of the causal assumptions that underlie interest in the cognition-marital distress association. One of these is that cognitions initiate or maintain marital distress.

Do cognitions cause marital distress? In addressing this question it behooves us to recognize that practical and ethi- cal considerations make it difficult to use experimental methods to address causal questions in the marital area. Even if such methods were easily applied, it is impossible to verify the existence of a cognition let alone demonstrate its

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causal impact. As with classes of observed behaviors (e.g., aggressive behavior) and marital satisfaction, one is dealing with a construct and seeking data that are consistent with inferences about the construct.

Although it is possible to infer that cognitions influence marital satisfaction from the concurrent correlations reviewed earlier, such an inference cannot be held with much confidence as it is equally possible that cognitions (if not synonymous with satisfaction) are caused by satisfaction. In the absence of experimental data, stronger evidence regarding such causal inferences can be obtained by introducing a temporal component to research, as it is widely accepted that causes precede effects and not vice versa. This is one reason why longitudinal research is becoming increasingly popular in the marital literature (see Bradbury, in press; Bradbury & Karney, 1993).

The usual data analytic procedure in longitudinal research has an added advantage in the present context. Because only the variance that cognitions do not share with satisfaction is used to predict changes in satisfaction, it is difficult to account for significant findings by arguing that cognitions simply index satisfaction. As might be expected, most of the available data pertain to attributions. In an initial study, Fincham and Bradbury (1987) showed that indices of maladaptive causal and responsibility attributions for partner behavior and marital problems predicted declines in wives', but not husbands', satisfaction over a 12-month period. Im- portantly, earlier satisfaction did not predict changes in attributions, a pattern of findings that is consistent with the view that attributions initiate marital distress. In a subsequent study, Bradbury (1990) obtained similar findings over a 12-month period for husbands but not wives.

A third study using a larger sample replicated these findings in that the 12-month longitudinal relation between attributions and satisfaction was found for both husbands and wives. However, husbands' initial satisfaction also predicted change in their attributions, suggesting a possible bidirectional causal relation between attributions and satisfaction (Fincham & Bradbury, 1993). This study also ruled out depression as a factor responsible for the longitudinal association and showed that the findings did not change when those who were chronically depressed or distressed were excluded from the sample. Finally, in a sample of nonviolent newlywed husbands, maladaptive responsibility attributions contributed to declines in reported satisfaction 12 months later but not vice versa (Fincham, Bradbury, et al., 1993), thereby showing that the longitudinal pattern of findings extends beyond the population of relatively stable and established married couples.

The few longitudinal data pertaining to beliefs are less clear-cut. Although initial RBI scores were unrelated to change in newlyweds' satisfaction over 3 years (Kurdek, 1991), over 4 years during the transition to parenthood (Kurdek, 1993a), or over a 1-year period in established marriages (Fincham & Bradbury, 1987), changes in beliefs

were correlated with changes in satisfaction in the first two cases. In a similar vein, Bradbury (1990) found that initial marital satisfaction was positively related to changes in general efficacy expectations over 12 months but that, for wives, earlier efficacy also predicted changes in satisfaction. As regards specific expectations prior to a problem-solving discussion, husbands' expectations of lower rates of positive wife behavior and wives' expectation of tension during the interaction predicted declines in satisfaction over a 12- month period.

To summarize, some data consistent with a causal relation in which attributions influence satisfaction have been obtained in all the studies conducted to date. Although less persuasive, data pertaining to the RBI and efficacy expectations do not rule out a causal relation between these variables and marital distress. Thus, research on cognition has begun to advance our understanding of marriage by identifying cognitive variables that may initiate and/or maintain marital distress. This understanding would be enhanced if it illuminated the mechanisms whereby such an influence occurs. Direct effects of cognition on satisfaction are plausible but most theoretical statements emphasize indirect effects that are mediated by the impact of cognitions on behavior. Underlying much of the interest in cognition is therefore a second causal assumption, namely, that cognitions influence behavior.

Do cognitions influence marital behavior? Owing to the difficulty of conducting experiments in marital research, this question can be addressed initially by asking whether or not cognitions correlate with behavior. Early studies supported such an association for attributions (see Bradbury & Fincham, 1990) but did not show that the attribution- behavior relation occurred independently of marital satisfaction, a major shortcoming in view of the documented association between behavior and marital satisfaction. With marital satisfaction partialled from the relation, it has recently been shown that (a) wives' nonbenign responsibility attributions were related to less effective problem-solving behaviors coded from a marital interaction (Bradbury & Fincham, 1992, Study 1) and (b) husbands' and wives' nonbenign causal and responsibility attributions were related to increased rates of negative behavior during a problem- solving discussion (Bradbury & Fincham, 1992, Study 2), and to increased rates of specific negative affects (Fincham & Bradbury, 1992). It also appears that these attribution- behavior relations are stronger for distressed spouses (Brad- bury & Fincham, 1992). As regards the RBI, there is now some evidence that wives' unrealistic beliefs are related to higher rates of negative behavior and lower rates of avoid- ant behavior in interactions (Bradbury & Fincham, 1993).

Finding that spouses' cognitions are related to their rates of behavior is encouraging but does not address whether the cognitions guide responses to particular partner behaviors and not others. For example, attributions are thought to be evoked by and guide responses to negative behavior. Con-


sistent with this view, Bradbury and Fincham (1992, Study 2) found that wives' maladaptive attributions correlated with the tendency to reciProcate negative husband behavior, the hallmark of marital distress. Similarly, husbands' RBI scores correlated with their tendency to reciprocate negative behavior and wives' scores were inversely related to their tendency to respond positively to negative husband behavior (Bradbury & Fincham, 1993). The partialling of satisfaction from these relations suggests that they do not simply reflect the dominant sentiment of spouses toward their partner ("sentiment override").

Although impressive, such correlational data can never be as convincing as experimental data for inferring causa- tion. It is therefore worth noting that the data reviewed are consistent with the findings of the one experimental study conducted on this topic. Fincham and Bradbury (1988) showed that manipulating attributions for a negative partner behavior influenced distressed spouses subsequent behavior toward the partner. Thus, both correlational and experimental findings are consistent with the view that spousal cognitions, particularly attributions, influence marital behavior.

Summary. Available data on cognition in marriage are perhaps more impressive (replicable phenomenon, systematic research, etc.) than those documenting any marital phenomenon studied in psychology. Extant research documents a robust association between cognition and marital satisfaction, addresses artifactual explanations for the association, provides data consistent with the view that cognitions influence satisfaction and marital behavior, and provides some, albeit limited, guidance on the content of the cognitions important for understanding marital satisfaction. These data do not appear to be scientifically invalid despite heavy reliance on self-report and, rather than simply reflecting spouses' sentiment (satisfaction) toward the marriage, provide insights for understanding such sentiment. Moreover, such research complements information obtained from the observation of spouse behavior. For example, the reciproca- tion of negative behaviors by distressed spouses may well reflect the nonbenign attributions they make for negative parmer behaviors.

Notwithstanding current progress, the development of research on cognition in marriage has been uneven and assumptions underlying research developments have not always been recognized. The importance of making assumptions explicit is underscored by the cohesion it lends to an area of inquiry (as hopefully demonstrated in the forego- ing review) and the opportunity it affords to link research in marriage to broader research endeavors in the parent disci- pline (e.g., study of close relationships, social cognition). Consequently, the next section identifies a theme that, while not entirely overlooked, has received minimal attention despite its potential to unify much of the research on cognition in marriage, to broaden the conception of cognition that guides the research, and to forge links with related areas of inquiry.

A Unifying Theme: Broadening the Conception of Cognition in Marital Research

Although prompted by clinical observations, most research on cognition in marriage has not focused directly on concrete clinical problems (cf. relative paucity of intervention studies). One consequence is that clinical observation has been less influential in this area than it might be. For example, clinicians, especially those with a broadly psycho- dynamic orientation, have long emphasized the importance for understanding marital distress of representational worlds, object relations schemata, or some such descriptor to denote a knowledge structure that organizes and gives meaning to marital experiences (see Mitchell, 1988, for an overview). Indeed, object relations schemata played a critical theoretical role in Raush et al.'s (1974) seminal study that helped to launch systematic marital research in psychology. The failure of this theoretical perspective to inform subsequent marital research is perhaps understandable in view of the negative reaction to self-report that helped launch observational studies of marriage.

Surprisingly, however, a very similar emphasis on knowledge structures is embodied in the theoretical framework that was invoked in observational studies of marriage. So- cial Exchange Theory posits that relationship outcomes are a function of rewards and costs, a perspective compatible with the behavioral orientation that initially informed systematic research on marriage in psychology. This theoretical framework is, however, avowedly cognitive in its inclusion of subjective estimations of rewards and costs (and of other constructs in the framework such as comparison levels, alternatives and investments). In fact, it necessarily assumes the existence of higher order knowledge structures (e.g., attitudes) that guide the processing of partner behavior and bestow meaning upon it. Perhaps the failure to develop this cognitive underpinning of exchange theory in research on marriage is due to the fact that it was rarely stated explicitly in marital writings (see Schindler & Vollmer, 1984, for an exception).

Despite their numerous differences, it therefore appears that a similar theme can be identified in the writings of psychodynamically oriented clinicians and behaviorally oriented marital researchers, namely, that spouse's relational knowledge structures are critical to understanding marital distress. This simple observation has profound implications. First, it suggests that extant research on cognition in marriage may be more cohesive than hitherto thought. Attribu- tions, beliefs, and so on may be reflective of a common, underlying knowledge structure that is critical for understanding marital satisfaction. Second, it draws attention to the origin of cognitive variables associated with marital distress, an issue that has been ignored. Yet understanding the knowledge structures that gives rise to a particular judgment (e.g., attribution, expectancy) and how these structures develop is likely to be critical to understanding marital cognition and to effective cognitive interventions. Third, this

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view emphasizes the need to study cognitive processes (e.g., how knowledge structures guide the encoding, storage, and retrieval of information about the partner or marriage), an- other topic that has gained virtually no attention. Two important corollaries follow: (a) self-report becomes less central and nonconscious cognition assumes center stage (much cognitive processing cannot be assessed meaningfully by self-report; despite access to the products or outcomes of such processes, it occurs outside of conscious awareness), and (b) the study of cognition in marriage is linked to broader research efforts to understand human cognition (e.g., cognitive science deals with the representation of knowledge and the processes or operations that transform it [Sharkey, 1986] and therefore provides fertile ground for research on cognition in marriage).

Because the implications of this change in perspective for clinical research and practice have been spelled out elsewhere (Fincham & Bradbury, 1991; Fincham et al., 1990), the remainder of this section offers some cautionary notes before illustrating concretely how it is beginning to change research on cognition in marriage.

Cautionary notes. Lest it appear otherwise, the current argument is not intended simply to emphasize the overrid- ing importance of "theory-driven" or "top-down" processing, a position that is widespread in the broader clinical research literature and can also be found in marital writings. Preoccupation with this form of processing in social cognition research and in clinical research may reflect an "availability heuristic bias" on the part of psychologists (Higgins & Bargh, 1987). Rather it is to argue that such processing has a place in the study of cognition in marriage and that the task is to identify how knowledge structures are linked to cognitive processes in marriage, to the state of the spouse, and to the nature of the information perceived. The way forward therefore is likely to involve sensitivity to the relation between existing knowledge and current information rather than a predetermined commitment to show that spouses are either theory- or data-driven processors. The importance of this viewpoint is emphasized by the fact that the "schema concept is too easy to overextend" (Abelson & Black, 1986, p. 6) and overstatement of the theory-driven view ("schematic processing") has retarded progress in social and clinical research. It behooves marital researchers to benefit from, rather than repeat, the lessons found in other areas of inquiry.

A second issue concerns the specificity of statements about knowledge structures. Although knowledge structures are commonly investigated in subdisciplines such as cognitive psychology and social cognition, surprisingly little research has focused on knowledge structures specific to relationships (Baldwin, 1992). An exception is the limited attention paid to concepts such as schemas, scripts, and prototypes within the close relationships literature (e.g., Ginsburg, 1988; Planalp, 1987; see also Read & Miller, 1991, and Surra & Bohman, 1991). Building on such work,

and drawing heavily from cognitive psychology and social cognition literatures, Baldwin (1992) recently offered a sophisticated conceptual analysis of how "relational schemas," or cognitive structures representing regularities in patterns of interpersonal relatedness, influence the processing of social information. However, even this sophisticated analysis is somewhat vague about the relations among con- sensually held schemas (representing culturally shared knowledge about a relationship), an individual's schema of close relations (including marriage), and the schema relating to the individual's own marriage. Attempts to distinguish these levels of analysis empirically (e.g., Fletcher & Kininmonth, 1992) and conceptually (e.g., Fletcher & Fit- ness, 1993; Surra & Bohman, 1991) in the close relationships literature augurs well for future marital research. Once the schema construct is appropriately conceptualized, attention can be given to how to study the interaction between spouses' schemas, a much needed task if a relational level of analysis is to be fully realized in this area of inquiry.

Illustrations. The impact on marital research of focusing directly on knowledge structures is illustrated using two seemingly disparate levels of analysis, the study of narra- fives or stories and of microlevel cognitive processes. Each yields insights about knowledge structures that, in turn, have the potential to advance our understanding of marital satisfaction.

It has long been recognized that narratives reveal different information about the perceived meaning of events (e.g., nonconscious motivations, themes) than answers to direct questions (e.g., Murray, 1938). Free-flowing narratives may potentially reveal much about knowledge structures that simply does not emerge from closed-ended questioning. Be- cause it is a more natural way to convey information, it may also be less inhibiting and therefore less reflective of self- presentation concerns than answers to direct questions. De- spite notable exceptions (e.g., Harvey, Orbuch, & Weber, 1992; Planalp & Surra, 1992), "few social scientists have undertaken narrative or accounts methods as basic sources of observation about relationships" (Veroff, Sutherland, Chadiha, & Ortega, 1993a, p. 440). The importance of this omission is emphasized by the fact that memories are often stored as narratives (Schank, 1990).

The potential contribution of narratives for understanding marital satisfaction is illustrated by a recent program of research on the stories newlyweds tell about the development of their relationship (see Veroff et al., 1993a, for an overview). Among the many interesting aspects of this research is the finding that reference to the couple, rather than each individual, was positively associated with satisfaction 2 years later. This finding is consistent with longitudinal changes in dating couples where dyadic reasons for relationship maintenance predicted increases in satisfaction (cf. Fletcher, Fincham, Cramer, & Heron, 1987) and with newlyweds explanations for changes in commitment during their courtship where reasons focused on the dyad were


associated with higher marital satisfaction 4 years after the interview (Surra, Arizzi, & Asmussen, 1988). Such findings suggest that the extent to which dyadic features are salient in relationship knowledge structures may be important for understanding relationship satisfaction. Other results also suggest shifts in the loci of research. For example, the theme of religion (a topic virtually ignored by marital researchers) in newlyweds' narratives predicted increases in wives' satisfaction 2 years later, whereas the presence of a finance theme predicted declines in husbands' satisfaction over the same period (Veroff, Sutherland, Chadiha, & Or- tega, 1993b).

Although both theory and method are in the early stages of development, the potential of a narrative approach is likely to be realized to the extent that it is integrated with a broader cognitive literature (e.g., Read & Collins, 1992). The advantage of the narrative approach in the present context is that it is likely to broaden the study of cognition in marriage. For example, changes in stories and how this may influence satisfaction is already raising questions regarding memory in relationships (e.g., Holmberg & Holmes, in press).

At the opposite extreme of the broad, story themes that may provide a window on knowledge structures are the microprocesses that occur when information is encoded, stored, retrieved, and so on. The study of such cognitive processes also has the potential to reveal much about the role of knowledge structures in relationships.

Priming, or making readily accessible a concept to examine its influence on the processing of information, is perhaps one of the most pervasive methodologies used to demonstrate the influence of knowledge structures in human information processing. Although little use has been made of this procedure in research on close relationships, the investigation of constructs that are chronically accessible has begun. Such research has the potential to show how existing knowledge structures may influence how new information is un- derstood. For example, Fletcher, Rosanowski, and Fitness (1993) showed that persons with strongly held beliefs about the importance of intimacy or passion in the success of close relationships were influenced by these beliefs when making judgments about their relationship that were relevant to these beliefs. This influence appeared to occur automat- ically, without any effort on the part of the person or the need for cognitive resources. Specifically, the time taken to make belief-relevant judgments did not vary across conditions where either complete or limited cognitive resources were available. In contrast, persons with weakly held beliefs showed slower response times when limited cognitive resources were available. For belief-irrelevant judgments, both groups were slower when cognitive resources were limited. These researchers carefully tested a number of in- terpretations of the results (e.g., they ruled out relationship satisfaction as an explanation) and concluded that the pattern of findings most likely reflects the accessibility of

strongly held beliefs that influenced nonconscious cognitive processing.

How might such an approach advance understanding of marital satisfaction? As noted earlier, it has been argued that judgments about the partner/marriage are more likely to reflect the spouse's satisfaction or sentiment than the data they have relating to the question to which they respond-- the "sentiment override" hypothesis. However, a spouse's satisfaction can be conceptualized as an integral part of their knowledge structures (e.g., in an associative network model) pertaining to the relationship/partner that may itself be more or less accessible. When easily accessible, satisfaction and its correlates should be more highly related. In other words, the correlates of marital satisfaction might vary de- pending on the accessibility of evaluations of the marriage/ partner.

The role of the accessibility of marital satisfaction has recently been investigated. One operationalization used to study the accessibility of attitudes is the speed with which a person makes overall evaluations of an attitude object (Fazio, in press). Using this operationalization, Fincham, Gamier, et al. (1993) found that correlations between marital satisfaction and expected partner behavior preceding a problem-solving discussion were significantly higher for husbands with highly accessible evaluations (faster responders) compared to husbands with less accessible evaluations (slower responders). In addition, such differences were found for both husbands and wives on ratings of con- tributions to marital events (e.g., "causing arguments between the two of you"). Because the speed of making eval- uative judgments about an attitude object is related to the extremity of the attitude toward the object, it is important to note that in this study accessibility was defined at each level of satisfaction. The finding that correlates of satisfaction vary as a function of the accessibility satisfaction is therefore independent of level of satisfaction.

The study of microlevel processes has profound implications. Perhaps the most obvious concerns our understanding of sentiment override. It cannot be assumed that all spouses, even those who are maritally distressed, exhibit sentiment override. Rather spouses are likely to differ in the degree to which they make judgments and behave on the basis of their sentiment toward their partner, a variable that needs to be considered in our clinical assessments. Thus, for example, the clinician needs to determine when judgments about partner behavior provide information about the behavior (likely for spouses whose accessibility to satisfaction is low) and when they simply provide information about the sentiment of the spouse making the judgment (likely for spouses whose accessibility to satisfaction is high). As regards intervention, the effectiveness of therapies that focus only on behavioral change may vary according to the accessibility of the partners' marital satisfaction; increasing accessibility may render the intervention less effective. This is because spouses whose satisfaction is chronically accessible may

194 Fincham

perceive and process changes in partner behavior in terms of their affect toward the partner.

An equally important implication is that the accessibility of satisfaction may significantly enhance our understanding of this central, marital construct. The incorporation of accessibility in the study of satisfaction and its correlates is analogous to the refinement of a diagnostic category in a psychiatric nosology into several subcategories. It is not that the original broad category is wrong, but rather that it is crude. The more homogenous subcategories allow a more precise picture to emerge that includes differential correlates for subcategories and the discovery of new correlates.

Finally, it is worth noting that the kind of nonconscious, involuntary (automatic) cognitive processing studied thus far is quite limited. It is concerned with memory processes triggered by conscious, voluntary (controlled) processing demands and involves theory-driven automatic processes. Such automatic processing is different from data-driven automatic processing that occurs independently of controlled processing demands (cf. Bargh, 1989). Although in its infancy, this microlevel approach has considerable potential to enhance the study of cognition in marriage.

Cognitive Variables and Marital Therapy Outcome

As noted at the outset of this article, the handful of available treatment studies show that there is as yet no evidence that cognitive interventions are more effective than standard behavioral marital therapy (BMT) or that their addition to such therapy improves treatment outcome (see Baucom & Ep- stein, 1990, and Fincham et al., 1990, for reviews). It is doubtful whether or not we should accept this conclusion, as will be become apparent in addressing our second question: What have we learned from therapy outcome research on cognitive interventions with couples?

To answer this question, we need to note some features of extant outcome research that make it difficult, if not impossible, to determine the role of cognitive variables in chang- ing marital satisfaction. First, statistical power to detect differences between treatments is extremely low (cf. Kazdin & Bass, 1989). Second, the assessment of cognition is either absent or extremely limited (e.g., nearly all available data pertain to the RBI or its individually focused counterpart, the Irrational Beliefs Test). Third, no attempt is made to determine whether or not cognitive changes are correlated with changes in outcome (see Halford, Sanders, & Behrens, 1993, for an exception), and hence the best available cognitive interventions (e.g., as described by Baucom & Epstein, 1990) have never been evaluated.

Fourth, the link between the research literature on cognition in marriage and therapy outcome research is tenuous at best (e.g., it is not possible to determine whether or not expected attributional changes occur in therapy, because no published study has assessed attributions), and it can be argued that the best cognitive interventions have yet to be

formulated, because they will follow from research that is only now becoming available. Fifth, it is clear that interventions with different labels overlap considerably, and attempts to separate cognitive from noncognitive components of interventions seem artificial. For example, the communication skills training so integral to BMT necessarily challenges cognition (e.g., that the partner is to blame for problems). The newest addition t o such therapy, teaching couples the longstanding Judeo-Christian precept of"accep- tance," can even be wholly conceptualized as a change in cognitions and emotion (see Baucom & Epstein, 1991). It is therefore not surprising to find that BMT produces change in cognition (e.g., Halford et al., 1993).

Even the few preceding observations suggest that it is premature to draw the conclusion that cognitive variables are unimportant or irrelevant to therapy. Indeed, a moment of reflection shows that it is impossible to conceive of an intervention that does not at some level address cognitive variables. Thus, like the systems theorists who note that it is impossible not to communicate in a relationship (e.g., Watzlawick, Beavin, & Jackson, 1967, pp. 48-50), I would argue analogously that one cannot avoid cognition in couples therapy. I am not thereby arguing that more complete evaluation of cognitive interventions will show them to be as efficacious as BMT or to enhance BMT. Rather, from the perspective I am advocating, the question changes from one of horse races between cognitive interventions and "other" interventions to considering how best to conceptual- ize the role of cognitive variables in therapy, making explicit ignored cognitive aspects that exist in extant therapies, and determining whether or not there is anything to be gained by making spouse cognitions an explicit target of intervention.

Recognizing that cognition may play a variety of roles in therapy raises the question of whether or not it is sufficient to evaluate the effectiveness of cognitive interventions simply by examining changes in marital satisfaction. Cognitive interventions may be most likely to carry the primary bur- den of increasing satisfaction when the marital problem concerns the couple's understanding of their relationship and of partner behaviors. Interventions across psycho- dynamic (e.g., insight oriented therapy; cf. Snyder, Man- grum, & Wills, 1993), behavioral (attention to cognitive changes in communication training; cf. Jacobson & Mar- golin, 1979, p. 35, chap. 7 and elsewhere), and systems (reframing, paradoxical strategies; cf. Nichols, 1984)orientations are designed to change spouses' understanding (knowledge structures), albeit sometimes implicitly. How- ever, the conditions under which cognitive interventions alone can change marital satisfaction are likely to be quite limited. Rather cognitive interventions may play a variety of roles at different points in therapy and with regard to different goals.

The importance of cognitive variables in therapy becomes more apparent when a variety of therapeutic goals is considered. First, goals pertaining to outcome need to be


reconceptualized in intervention research so that efficacy is evaluated in terms of more specific goals that actually reflect the outcomes desired by couples. Such goals might include, but not be limited to, decreased anger and blame, enhanced sexuality, greater intimacy and confiding, better support in time of stress, and enhanced affective exchange as well as more traditional goals such as greater ability to discuss disagreements more productively or insight into the deeper causes of marital problems. Developing a more di- versified set of possible goals would serve the dual purpose of better reflecting clinical reality and at the same time make it easier to see that different cognitive interventions might be associated with change relating to different specific goals or problem areas.

Second, it is important to recognize that not all therapy goals relate directly to outcome. Even if cognitive variables are critical to the realization of such goals this will not be reflected in a literature that examines only therapeutic outcome. For example, cognitive interventions can play an important role in setting the stage for therapy. More general marital problems (e.g., communication problems) are often secondary to a profound sense of blame and mistrust when a couple presents for therapy. Behavioral marital therapists clearly recognize this when they stress the importance of the couple having a "collaborative set" for the success of behavioral interventions (cf. Jacobson & Margolin, 1979). Inter- ventions that help the couple move beyond blame pave the way for further therapeutic work (see Beach, 1991, for strategies to deal with such blame). The impact of such interventions is unlikely to be evident in studies that focus only on treatment outcome.

A further example of the potential importance of cognitive interventions in therapy is the role they may play in facilitating noncognitive mediating goals of therapy. Per- haps the most critical mediating goal in therapy is compliance with therapist directives (see Beach & Bauserman, 1990, for a discussion of how cognitive interventions can be used to deal with noncompliance). The importance of this role is emphasized by the mundane observation that in the absence of compliance treatment cannot be effective.

Finally, cognitive interventions may play a role in the maintenance of therapeutic gain following the termination of therapy. In particular, attention to the spouses' construal of the processes leading to therapeutic change can be important. Change attributed to external factors (e.g., the skill of the therapist) may be less likely to endure than change attributed to internal factors (e.g., couple's commitment to make the relationship work). Similarly attention to specific

situations and stressors likely to be associated with a return to marital discord, and to the tendency to revert to prior habitual behaviors when an argument occurs, could prove useful in helping couples keep a marital dispute from bring- ing about a return to baseline levels of marital distress.

To summarize, the most important lesson we have learned from outcome studies evaluating cognitive interventions is that a more refined and sophisticated approach is needed if we are to understand the role of cognitive variables in marital therapy. Toward this end, there is the need to (a) expand cognitive assessments and interventions to reflect the broader conception of cognition that is emerging in marital cognition research and come to terms with the overlearned, automatic cognitions that are likely to characterize much of married life, (b) focus on the processes that mediate change and address these processes throughout therapy rather than in a self-contained "cognitive intervention" module, and (c) examine indices of therapeutic outcome other than marital satisfaction.

Conclusion

Motivated by the seemingly disparate views of cognition offered by research on behavior and on therapy outcome, this article examined directly data on cognition in marriage by asking two questions. The first, "What have we learned about marital distress from research on cognitive variables?" was addressed in terms of the assumptions that motivated interest in the study of cognition. It led to the identification of a unifying theme that might advance inquiry in this area, namely, the study of knowledge structures. In addressing the second question, "What have we learned from therapy outcome studies on cognitive interventions with couples?" the need for a more sophisticated approach to intervention studies was noted and a number of suggestions were made to maximize the informativeness of such studies.

It is apparent that the study of cognition in marriage is no longer in its infancy. Like the toddler learning to walk, its movements are not fully coordinated and its potential is great. The extent to which this potential is realized will rest on a number of factors. Perhaps the most important of these concern broadening the conception of cognition that has thus far informed marital research and integrating the study of marriage with both broader efforts to understand close relationships and to understand cognition. Such developments combined with the insights gained from clinical experience will undoubtedly lead to richer, applied research on cognition in marriage.

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Cognition in marriage: Current status and future challenges