Fundamentals of happiness

Funny — as in odd — to run across an article today on happiness in marriage, just after posting the below articles on civility, politeness and the art of conversation.

It’s also interesting that the article below on conversation is from The Economist, the issue with the cover story called “Happiness (and how to measure it)”. And it’s no coicidence that one if the repeated points in the article on the art of conversation is the necessity of being a good listener…

…which also turns up in this article on happiness in marriage.

What Makes Women Happy in Their Marriages?

W. Bradford Wilcox and Steven Nock recently tackled this question in an article, “What’s Love Got To Do With It?,” published in the March 2006 issue of Social Forces, one of the leading journals of sociology in the U.S. The article has attracted a great deal of media coverage—in venues as varied as The New York Times, NBC’s The Today Show, Slate, and National Review Online.

This is a website that summarizes the study’s key findings and who they apply to, which might surprise a lot of people.

The top predictors of women’s marital happiness, in order of importance:

1. A husband’s emotional engagement.

Women who are married to men who make an effort to listen to them, who express affection and appreciation on a regular basis, and who share quality time with them on a regular basis (date nights, frequent conversations focusing on mutual interests and one another) are much happier in their marriages than women who do not have emotionally-engaged husbands…

2. Fairness.

This doesn’t mean a 50-50 split of all the duties. It’s more how the general load of responsibilities in the family is being carried.

So, in the average marriage, husbands and wives devote about the same amount of total hours to the paid and unpaid work associated with caring for a family.

3. A breadwinning husband.

American wives, even wives who hold more feminist views about working women and the division of household tasks, are typically happier when their husband earns 68% or more of the household income…

4. A commitment to marriage.

Wives who share a strong commitment to the norm of lifelong marriage with their husband—e.g., who both believe that even unhappily married couples should stay together for the sake of their children—are more likely to have a happy marriage than couples who do not share this commitment to marriage. Shared commitment seems to generate a sense of trust, emotional security, and a willingness to sacrifice for one’s spouse—all of which lead to happier marriages for women.

5. Staying at home.

You read this. It’s got to do with time pressures and juggling and “role overload.” A lot of folks can relate to that, right?

6. Shared religious attendance.

Wives who attend church or some other worship service with their husbands tend to be happier than wives who do not share religious attendance with their husbands. Religious attendance may give wives a sense that God is present in their marriage, a sense that their husband seeks to please them by attending church with them, and/or access to other married couples who value marriage and can provide them with guidance and moral support for their marriages.

7. Traditional gender attitudes.

Okay, you read that one, too. It’s interesting.

Who do these predictors apply to, you may be wondering. Researchers did too. So they asked.

Four Key Questions:

A. Does this study apply to more feminist-minded women?

Yes…

(read the rest on the site)

B. Does this study apply to less-educated women?

For the most part, yes…

(ditto)

C. Does this study apply to every married woman?

The study’s findings are averages and they do not apply to every married woman. There are, of course, feminist-minded women in egalitarian marriages who are very happy, just as there are traditional-minded women in traditional marriages who are very unhappy…

D. Are wives likely to be happier if they have more of these predictors?

Wives who have more of the above predictors tend to be the happiest wives…

And, to turn a popular phrase around, ‘if Mama’s happy, everybody’s happy.’

Susie and Jeff Frank have devoted their blog Wedding at Cana to examining issues of marriage, both healthy and unhealthy ones. They have good meditations there, and offer resources, especially spiritual ones.