People often ask me about my success rate in marriage counseling. The short answer is, “I don’t know. I’m not a researcher.”
The longer answer involves issues like: how do you define success? Most would say that the couple is happily married. What’s “happy”? How long? If they’re still married a month later, is that a success? If they divorce twenty years later, is that a failure?
Most therapists would define success as whether or not the couple met their goals. What if they don’t agree on the goals of marriage counseling? What is they’re satisfied with the outcome, but it’s not the kind of marriage I would want to be involved in?
The truth of the matter is research is complicated and (for me) tedious; clinicians (those of us who actually provide counseling/therapy) and researchers are two different animals. A few are able to do both and do them well. Most of us are content to treat them as separate but related fields within the mental health profession.
Most of what passes for outcome studies or claims of efficacy by marriage counselors is really a brief measurement of client satisfaction. Useful from a marketing standpoint, but not really the kind of research clients and referral sources are wanting to hear.
In a new study by John Wright, a psychology professor at the University of Montreal, asks the question, how effective is marriage counseling. Dr. Wright offers a criticism of marriage counseling research:
The methodology of many studies is flawed, says Wright. The major bias is excluding couples with a depressed, alcoholic, or violent spouse, the recently divorced or those with sexual dysfunction, drug abuse problems, or personality disorders, from study protocols. “Researchers eliminate the most difficult cases,” he notes. “Yet the most dysfunctional couples are often those who bear multiple emotional scars. Excluding them can only yield a biased image of reality.” Couples described as “highly ambivalent” are often excluded as well, yet Wright points out that some couples who live in a state of ambivalence for 20 or 30 years are quite functional.
In an interview with the Globe and Mail (How to measure marriage counselling), Wright claims:
If both people are committed to the relationship, then at least 50 per cent are likely to attain marital happiness after working with a counselor, he and his colleagues found.
In the case of couples in which one or both partners are ambivalent, one-third are able to start improving their relationship after therapy; one-third stay on the fence and accept that they are staying together under less-than-ideal conditions, perhaps for the sake of the children; and the other third move into separation mode.
I often tell couples I can help them improve their marriage if three conditions are met:
1) That there be no abuse. No alcohol abuse, no drug abuse, and no physical abuse. It’s not that a marriage can’t be helped if abuse is present; I’ve just come to the belief that the abuse issues have to be addressed before significant changes in the relationship can occur.
2) That there is no on-going affair. I can’t do marriage counseling if there are three people in the relationship. I advocate a complete amputation of the outside relationship if marriage counseling is to move forward.
3) That each partner have some degree of motivation. I don’t ask for or expect each spouse to be 100% committed to the marriage; at least not in the early stages of therapy. But, people come to counseling for a variety of reasons. If one spouse is intent on divorce and is only present to keep up appearances, then I’m not likely to be of any help. (I had one couple visit me in the morning and inform me I had one hour… they already had an appointment with a divorce attorney scheduled for that afternoon.)
Will marriage counseling always work if the above three conditions are met? Yes; I think I can help couples improve their relationship. Will it produce the hormonally charged, I’ve-rediscovered-my-soulmate, and only-have-eyes-for-you feelings they once had? I hope so, but I can’t make that promise.
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I’m guessing the best measure will be what they write about you in your obituary.
Or don’t.
I rather put off that particular test for a while.