The Marriage Checkup: a randomized controlled trial of annual relationship health checkups

Abstract

Objective: This study assessed the efficacy of the Marriage Checkup (MC) for improving relationship health and intimacy.

Method: Cohabiting married couples (N = 215, Mage women = 44.5 years, men = 47 years, 93.1% Caucasian) recruited from a northeastern U.S. metropolitan area through print and electronic media were randomly assigned to MC treatment or wait-list control. Treatment but not control couples participated in assessment and feedback visits, at the beginning of the study and again 1 year later. All couples completed 9 sets of questionnaires over 2 years. Outcome measures included the Quality of Marriage Index, the Global Distress subscale of the Marital Satisfaction Inventory-Revised, the Intimate Safety Questionnaire, and the Relational Acceptance Questionnaire.

Results: A latent growth curve model indicated significant between-group differences in intimacy at every measurement point after baseline (d ranged from .20 to .55, Md = .37), significant between-group differences in women's felt acceptance for every measurement point after baseline (d ranged from .17 to .47, Md = .34), significant between-group differences in men's felt acceptance through the 1-year 2-week follow-up (d across follow-up ranged from .11 to .40, Md = .25), and significant between-group differences in relationship distress through 1-year 6-month follow-up (d across follow-up ranged from .11 to .39, Md = .23).

Conclusions: Longitudinal analysis of the MC supports the hypothesis that the MC significantly improves intimacy, acceptance, and satisfaction. Implications for dissemination are discussed.