Tuesday, 17 Apr, 2007 Science

The latest research showed that couples who have supportive marital relationships can deal with disturbing children easier and this only makes their marriage stronger.

A new study was conducted by Schoppe Sullivan, Sarah Mangelsdorf, Geoffrey Brown from University of Illinois together with Margaret Szewczyk from University of Minneapolis.

The study involved 97 couples expecting a baby who were examined for the extended period of time. Couples were questioned and videotaped before and after the child birth on the quality of their marital relationships and later on on their interaction with the child, when he or she was 3,5 months old. Researchers focused on couple's cooperation with each other, their activity with the child and how they managed to cope with the disturbing and fussy behavior of the child.

Researches came to a conclusion that good marital relationships are crucial in determining effective management with restless and agitated children . Compared with the couples who showed disagreement towards each other and were not cooperative in dealing with their baby, supportive partners showed effective cooperation.

The previous study conducted by the same researches concluded that badly cooperating parents are likely to have aggressive children.

The result of the new study emphasized that effective parenting has more to do with the cooperation of both parents rather than with the fact how each of the parents deal with their child.

Although, good marital partners are likely to be good coparents, these two notions may not coincide. However, in case when couple is better at coparenting, their marriage and dealing with the child benefit in either way.

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