Marital therapy, retreats, and books: the who, what, when, and why of relationship help-seeking - PubMed (original) (raw)

Marital therapy, retreats, and books: the who, what, when, and why of relationship help-seeking

Brian D Doss et al. J Marital Fam Ther. 2009 Jan.

Abstract

When doubts creep in and marriages begin to falter, where do couples turn for assistance? In a longitudinal study of 213 couples over the first 5 years of marriage, results indicated relationship help-seeking was relatively common, with 36% of couples seeking some form of outside help during this period. Individual and relationship difficulties predicted increased use of relationship books and marital therapy in the following year; therefore, these behaviors appear to be important outlets for relationship assistance. In contrast, attending marriage retreats/workshops was related only to demographic variables. Results of the present study suggest that the most common types of relationship help-seeking by community couples are understudied and likely underutilized in the dissemination of empirically based marital interventions.

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