The Relation Between Differentiation of Self and Marital Satisfaction: What Can Be Learned From Married People Over the Course of Life?

The study explores relationships between differentiation of self and marital satisfaction among 121 Israeli men and women at various stages of married life. Marital satisfaction was found to be inversely correlated with emotional cutoff, so that lower cutoff was associated with greater satisfaction. An interesting gender finding was that satisfaction was connected to emotional reactivity, emotional cutoff and I-position among men, but only related to emotional cutoff among women. Another gender difference was that level of marital satisfaction and duration of the marriage were negatively correlated for women and positively correlated for men. The present study sheds light on several notions of Bowen's (1978; Kerr Bowen, 1988) theory, and is the first to indicate a relation between differentiation and marital satisfaction among Israeli participants at various stages of marriage. Results suggest that a crucial balance of separation and closeness provides an optimal context for meeting the needs of spouses and promoting the healthy development of marital life.