(Editor’s Note: This article is the first of a three-part series entitled “Strengthening Relationships.”)
After watching a couple commu-nicating with each other for just five minutes, psychologist John Gottman can predict, with 91 percent accuracy, whether they’ll break-up or stay together. He learned to do this by observing many volunteer couples interact in overnight stays in a specially fabricated apartment in Seattle. The couples were instructed to act as naturally as possible, despite teams of scientists watching them behind one-way mirrors, taping every interaction, and tracking signs of stress or relaxation with sensors.
Gottman found that certain types of negative interactions were so lethal to a relationship, that he termed them the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. When a couple’s communication has become dominated by these kinds of exchanges, the relationship is in serious trouble:
In successful relationships, a lot of complaining goes on. Both parties say what they don’t like and what bothers them about each other. But complaining isn’t the same thing as criticizing. A complaint only addresses the specific action that you don’t like, for example, “I’m angry that you left your shorts on the bedroom floor last night.” A criticism is more global, tacking on jabs at your partner’s personality, such as, “You’re always such a slob. You left your shorts on the floor again? Can’t you ever learn? Or is it that you just don’t care about me?” etc. Criticism adds blame and character assassination to a specific complaint. The easiest way to turn a clean complaint into a nasty criticism is to add the words, “What’s wrong with you?”
Behaviors like sneering, name-calling, eye rolling, mockery and hostile humor all convey contempt or disgust toward a partner. Of the four Horsemen, Gottman found that contempt is by far the most lethal to a relationship. A close cousin to contempt is belli-gerence, a form of aggressive anger that includes threats or provocations. Contempt is usually a by-product of long-standing unresolved conflicts in a relationship, which lead to simmering negative thoughts about the partner. When a couple has reached the stage of mutual contempt, the relationship is infected with a kind of cancer and is in serious trouble. Contempt is also physically unhealthy. The research showed that couples who are contemptuous of one another are more likely than other people to suffer from infectious illnesses, such as colds and flus.
It’s natural to respond to criticism or contempt by defending oneself, but Gottman found that this reaction rarely has the desired effect. The partner doing the attacking usually doesn’t back down or apologize. That’s because defensiveness is really a way of blaming your partner and of saying, in effect, “The problem isn’t me; it’s you.” Defensiveness just escalates the conflict, which is why it’s so deadly to a relationship.
This pattern usually arrives later in a relationship, after the first three Horseman have created a sense of hopelessness about resolving the conflicts. When criticism and contempt lead to defensiveness, which leads to more contempt and defensiveness, eventually one party tunes out. You come home, your boyfriend starts in on you, and you respond by walking out of the room. Or you stay, but you look down or away, and sit impassively like a stone wall, conveying the impression that you couldn’t care less about what you’re hearing. The mask of indifference is fake: stonewallers are actually flooded with hurt, anxiety, and anger, and shut down to protect themselves from their emotional turbulence.
Gottman initially assumed, as do most couple counselors, that the key to saving relationships infected with these patterns was to teach them “fair fighting” techniques and better ways of negotiating their differences. But this idea wasn’t validated by the research. It turned out that what kept successful relationships healthy was not how the couple handled disagreements, but how they were with each other when they weren’t fighting.
What helps a troubled relationship is not so much focusing on resolving the conflicts (in successful relationships, both parties recognize that some conflicts and differences are never resolved), but to work deliberately on nurturing their mutual fondness and admiration for each other through specific techniques. The cure for cancerous contempt is not to examine “causes” of the contempt, but to turn to the honor and respect that the couple once felt for each other, and to work at building on that.
Next in this series: Healing a Wounded Relationship
Tom Moon is a psychotherapist in San Francisco. To learn more, please visit his website at tommoon.net
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