Inevitably, all couples also experience stress outside the family that spills over into their lives at home—strain at work, with friends, in the neighborhood, and so on. Partners who are distracted by these stressors find it difficult to listen fully, to place themselves in each other’s position, or to imagine how the other person is feeling. There are no simple solutions to this problem. What we suggest is that partners develop an experimental attitude and try small changes that might bring some relief. When Rick comes home from work, Anna could support his having 10 minutes to “chill out” while she ignores the belongings he dumped in the living room, as long as he has agreed to pick them up and join her in the kitchen to help afterward.
Although these examples illustrate that many of the conditions that support or interfere with empathy don’t start with the couple, the final condition—partners’ division of family work and care of the children and their effectiveness at solving problems—focuses more specifically on aspects of the couple relationship.
In our longitudinal studies, we have found that these issues play a critical role in both partners’ satisfaction with their overall relationship. Some researchers and couples argue that the secret of a satisfying relationship is a traditional arrangement of roles, with separate, well-defined tasks for men and women, whereas others argue that modern marriage calls for an egalitarian arrangement of a 50–50 division of family tasks and care of children, based on the partners’ available time, skills, and preferences. Our research suggests that more important than the specific arrangement of “who does what” is whether each partner feels that their arrangement fits their ideals and is fair.
Another key to couple satisfaction is the partners’ confidence that they have effective ways of tackling problems when they do arise. When partners are unable to work collaboratively to meet the challenges of family life, they are likely to be less empathic with one another and less satisfied with their overall relationship.
Collaboration relies on, and helps facilitate, clear and honest communication. While we said earlier that Rick and Anna don’t just need communication skills training, we hope that increased empathy will lead to more satisfying communication. Along these lines, couples therapist Dan Wile writes about how empathy isn’t just an attitude that partners can choose to adopt, but develops out of the couple’s interaction. As a therapist, Wile tries to help couples “get on a platform” from which they can look at their problems jointly and empathically and begin resolving their difficulties together. He discusses how empathy can be self-perpetuating, since an empathic exchange can help partners shift from behaving like enemies or strangers to feeling like allies. For instance, Rick might have said, “Anna, I can see that I created another mess, but I’m so wiped out by how my boss stole my ideas at work that I can’t move right this minute. What kind of time extension could you give me here?” This would have been more likely to put Anna at ease and take her out of an adversarial mindset. She might have found herself responding, “I’m sorry I snapped at you. I was tense because my day has been so frustrating, and I feel as if we haven’t connected for days.”
How can couples get on a “platform” in order to have nonadversarial discussions? Although it may sound like the last thing to do in the middle of a fight, they could try this: when one partner becomes upset, the other can start by asking questions about where the feelings are coming from, rather than attacking the partner or defending against the perceived attack. This can lead the troubled spouse to feel the partner’s empathy and be more willing to give a fuller explanation of what is upsetting about the situation.
Andrew Christensen and the late Neil Jacobson wrote about how empathic exchanges can turn problems “into vehicles for greater intimacy.” According to these researchers, one way to get partners to unite empathically with each other is to get at the soft feelings, such as sadness and fear, that underlie the more frequently and easily expressed hard feelings, like anger and resentment. Trying to understand where the other person is coming from can lead to both partners feeling as if their experience has been heard, which in turn allows them to feel safe expressing pain without blame. In this way, empathy can lead to acceptance and forgiveness. Psychologist and marital therapist John Gottman suggests that a way for one partner to understand the other’s upsets is to take time to have regular discussions about each of their goals, dreams, and worries. Gottman suggests that these “love maps” of partners’ inner lives encourage them to be aware of each other’s changing needs so that they can be understanding and supportive when things go wrong.
Of course, managing to meet all five of these conditions that promote empathy all of the time is impossible, even for couples with many advantages in their lives. We know that it’s not enough to simply say, “Be more empathic” and “Don’t resort to blaming, unforgiving, contemptuous, or icy-silent behaviors.” Most couples would do these things if they could. What we are saying is this: empathy is so important to a relationship that if it appears to be low, partners must talk about ways that they can help each other to take a more empathic position. A first step in that direction might be to review an “empathy conditions checklist” to see whether anything can be done about any of the barriers to empathy that are affecting their lives.
WHAT IF COUPLES NEED HELP?
Our longitudinal studies of hundreds of families make it clear that life is stressful for most modern partners. Couples should pursue outside help if the partners have tried to create conditions to encourage more empathy and have failed to change the atmosphere between them. A consultation with a mental health professional might help get them started. An empathic helper who understands couples can often help improve the climate in which partners tackle their problems. Partners can learn gradually to take on this role themselves so that they can deal with future problems in more empathic and constructive ways.
Let’s return to Rick and Anna. After stewing in silence in different rooms, wondering whether their relationship will survive and wishing they could avoid these hurtful exchanges, Rick and Anna considered two choices. The first was to try to use some time together, possibly with the aid of some self-help books, to try to resolve some of the issues behind their conflicts. The second was to seek the help of a professional marriage counselor or couples therapist to teach them how to communicate more effectively. We are not able to predict which alternative would be more effective for them or for couples in similar situations. We do know that their impasse at this moment doesn’t necessarily mean that they’ve lost the chance to feel that early enchantment again. At the moment, they are struggling with demands that make it difficult for them to empathize with one another and to feel the delight that they experienced when they first met. But we are confident that there are practical and realistic steps that Rick and Anna can take to begin to work through this challenge to their relationship. If they can renew their ability to feel empathy for each other, we believe that they will be capable of recapturing the friendship, romance, and happiness they experienced years ago.
LOVE, HONOR, AND THANK