More Really Interesting Stuff from John Gottman

[xthread]

Back in 2003 when my marriage blew up, I did an awful lot of relationship research very fast. Unfortunately, we didn't follow aggressively enough on some of the research I did, but I did learn some really interesting basic stuff:

1. Couples Therapy has a horrific failure rate
   
2. Its the best game in town
   
3. There are a tiny number of people getting about a 20% or some such success rate ('success' being defined as 'the couple is still around 1-3 years later, depending upon whose math you use)
   
4. The Gottman Institute seems to have the most serious research-derived models and seems to be getting the best results. Notably, above 70% success rates, which is a damned far cry from 20%.
   

And it seems that the work that the Gottman Institute has been doing has continued on apace. Here is a very recent speech. Wow. Just wow.

Comments

[tshuma]

Interesting.... I've been told by a couples counselor that the majority of counseling fails simply because the couple in question seeks help after they've already reached a no-compromise point. All a counselor can suggest at that point is better ways and means of communicating the various sides of such a point, without materially changing the point itself. I.e., most people seek help only when there's trouble, which seems blatantly obvious. His contention was that there was something broken in the communication and expectation portions of the relationship all along, that may only become apparent when people no longer wish to compromise.

It's held true for a number of my friends. Those who were seeking relationship counseling before they were even married had a better chance of building a successful marriage. Those who waited until after marriage to seek counseling generally approached it as a "Well, we don't know how to fix this, so it's probably over, but what the heck. Try everything," usually discovered that no, they really were done.