Summary Of John Gottman's 'The Four Horsemen Of The Apocalypse'

Marriage is oftentimes praised for all its good qualities, but people tend to avoid discussing the downsides of marriage in order to avoid discomfort. Confronting the problems that many couples face in marriage is hard, and most people find it easier to simply overlook any issues they may face to avoid furthering the problem. In “My Problem With Her Anger,” Eric Bartels elaborates on the struggles he and his wife face and what experiencing the effects of spousal anger feels like from a husband’s perspective. Through emotional appeal and anecdotes, Bartels semi-successfully argues that husbands are too often, and unfairly, on the receiving end of their wives’ anger and stress.

At the core of every healthy marriage is the ability to successfully communicate with each other. If the individuals in the marriage do not communicate effectively, they are both likely to experience frustration, anger and resentment. Effective communication in marriage is honestly the most important aspect of a successful relationship. In “Cathedral,” Raymond Carver is saying that communication within marriage is key and when there is a lack of communication it can cause frustration. This makes each individual disconnected because their true feelings aren’t being talked about so nothing is being resolved. Nobody's born a natural communicator and good communication is the key to improving your relationship.

The Four Horsemen was written by Grantland Rice. He was a very well-known and elegant sports writer. His work has been published all over the world from newspapers to radio broadcasts. The Four Horsemen were four players from the national college team called Notre Dame. The team lost two games in three years. In the story, the team was playing against the Army.

    In their book, Boundaries in Marriage, the authors, Cloud and Townsend, present a theoretical model for maintaining healthy relationships, specifically marriage relationships. This examination of Cloud and Townsend’s approach to maintaining healthy relationships summarizes both the theoretical and theological orientation of their proposed model, compares their approach to the model proposed by Sandra Wilson in her book, Hurt people hurt people, and considers the model in the context of Dr. Hawkins concentric circle theory of personality, and parents a critique with regard to some’ of the perceived strengths and

“Will Your Marriage Last?”, by Aviva Patz, is a cohesive article about marriage and divorce. Aviva Patz is the executive editor of Psychology Today. Patz narrates the story of Ted Huston, a professor at the University of Texas, who followed the lives of 168 couples for 13 years after their wedding date. She was then able to draw conclusions about what makes a couple stay together or end up filing divorce papers. Although marriages and divorce are the themes of this article, it is really about society’s pressure on young people to be perfect.

This article by Deborah Tannen, written in 1990, addresses the differences between the communication styles of men and women and some of the ensuing problems that arise from these divergent behaviors. The article asserts "that although men tend to talk more than women in public situations, they often talk less at home. And this pattern is wreaking havoc with marriage" (p. 474). Research indicates that a majority of women state a lack of communication as the reason for seeking divorce as compared to only a few of the men. With the divorce rate at 50 percent the author says there is a "virtual epidemic of failed conversation" (p. 474) in America.

Dr. John Gottman, studying how wedded couple communicates, devised a system where he can prophesize if romantic partners will divorce or if they will remain married. With the discovery of a balance of negative and positive interactions, Dr. Gottman formulated a ratio of five positive interactions to one negative interaction that conceivably foretells a couples' satisfaction. Through his research, Dr. Gottman also composed a list of negative interactions that collectively cultivate a marriage's demise, deemed the “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,” (ClaytonKG, 2010, Jennings, 2010)

Cruel and violent acts committed on a spouse were utilized to express the potential for negative and violent experiences within a marriage. In addition, violence was used to criticize the other spouse’s behaviour.

“The story of us” is an excellent movie that portrays the roller-coaster of marriage in a humorous and cleaver way. The film reiterates the key concepts we have learned in our interpersonal communication class, in particular chapters ten and eleven on conflict management and improving communication climates. According to Gibb people feel defensive when they perceive that they are under attack. When defensive responses arise in interpersonal communications, it is the relationship itself that becomes defensive. This is evident in the Jordan’s communication patterns, the majority of exchanges between Ben and Katie

In their lab in Seattle they had 50 pairs of newlyweds come at different times and stay overnight at an apartment where they will be asked to act natural under the circumstances that they will be monitored for 12 hours straight starting at 9am and ending at 9pm. They have video cameras, microphones, and monitors strapped to their chests. With the scientific breakthrough, Gottman and Silver, believed monitoring the newlyweds overnight was the best way to receive the information needed. After an experiment of 130 newlyweds Gottman and Silver (1999), accurately predicted that 15 of the couples were to divorce. Seventeen did end of divorcing over the next seven years including the 15 that they predicted. Being able to predict who will remain happily married and who will divorce is and incredible talent, however being able to keep troubled marriages from crumbling would be an even more impressive talent. Gottman and Silver (1999), later discuss ways to keep troubled marriages going with their theory of seven principles for making marriage

Marriage is an adjustment between two people getting married Communication can cause a relationship to succeed or fail. If you do not share how you feel, it can cause your partner to withdraw. Listening can save a relationship. Schonberg (2011) found that “affective affirmation –basically, behavior that makes your partner feel loved cared for or special plays a role in a happy marriage and those men need it more than women. There are several factors and problems that can cause marriage to either succeed or fail. It is important to discuss problem things left unsaid can cause your partner to with draw.

Marriage requires effort and work. Many newlyweds come into a marriage thinking it is easy but do not consider the consequences of marriage that heavily rely on balances and partnership. Marriage is all about compromise. It is important to engage in a premarital program to allow both partners to learn what to expect within a marriage, how to face certain roadblocks, and to better communication when conflict is aroused so that divorce does not become an option. Gottman’s research (2009) has made a significant contribution to the study of relationship and marriage tying unity, harmony, and communication together to make relationship and marriage work. When a couple who does not have consummate love (intimacy, passion, and commitment), they often portray the six indicators of divorce: harsh startup, the Four Horsemen, flooding, body language, failed repair attempts and reflecting on bad memories (Gottman, 2009). Divorce often occurs within the first two years of marriages and almost half of divorces end within the first seven years (Bhutto-Ramirez, 2015).

The “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” are damaging behaviors identified from research conducted by social psychologist John Gottman. The ways these feeling are expressed is destructive and are associated with couples whose relationship will more than likely end in divorce. The “Four Horseman” are contempt, criticism, defensiveness, and stonewalling. Contempt, such as an eye roll, is an attack towards another’s sense of self with the intention of psychologically abuse or an insult. It often leaves the spouse feeling inferior or undesired. Criticism, for example a verbal attack towards another’s personality or their character, entails producing disapproving judgments or evaluations meant to indicate the faults one one’s partner. Defensiveness, like viewing oneself as the victim to deflect a forthcoming verbal attack and ultimately reverse the blame, is mentally preparing oneself against a presumed upcoming attack. Stonewalling, an example being withdrawn so as to avoid conflict to distance oneself from disapproval, is the act of refuting complaints and refusing to give them serious consideration. When using any of the “Four Horsemen” during a developing argument, the couple’s quarrel will often escalate rather quickly leaving both involved feeling contemptuous towards the other party and allow what could be a trivial issue to balloon into a much larger problem. This would leave the parties defensive towards each other and with negative feeling abound could signal an

In Willard F Harley, Jr.’s book entitled His Needs Her Needs: Building an Affair-Proof Marriage, the reasons for divorce are discussed. Harley discovered the simplest answer for why couples were struggling and marriages were failing. People were simply not in love with each other anymore. For many years, he and the majority of other marriage counselors around the nation struggled to piece back the relationships. He discusses his own discovery of why that was happening. He felt that counselors were paying attention to the wrong side of the issue. In general, counselors thought the key was to enhance communication to solve problems. Of course, that is apart of it, but that was not the “fix” for struggling couples. Counselors were so

Is every relationship perfect? Eric Swanson asked individuals about their marriage and their responses were surprising. “Amazingly, and consistently nearly 97 percent of married couples answer, “very happy” or “pretty happy… A mere 3-4 percent today would say they are “not too happy” (Swanson). True love is supposed to last a lifetime, but for the three percent remaining of unhappy couples results in divorce. Divorce is a negative decision because children develop stress and unstable futures; nevertheless we can solve the issues of divorce by visiting marriage counselors, communicating with one another, and partaking in trail marriages