Marital Satisfaction During the Honeymoon Period: A Comparative Study Between the Newlywed and Long-Term Married Couples

Abstract

Marriage is becoming vague and meaningless in contemporary culture, and there is little possibility for the social construction of marriage. Modern couples are choosing to remain unmarried because marriage is associated with a dramatic decline in happiness and overall satisfaction. Because younger couples are adopting a more westernised view of life and society, the Indian belief system in the concept of marriage is diminishing. The aim of the paper is to find out the emotions and the nature of happiness at the beginning of marriage and why it slowly fades over the years by also taking into account the factors responsible for a happy marriage, the cultural background and the nature of adjustment and adaptation present in the couples studied. A comparative qualitative study was conducted by taking a sample (N=30) of 15 newly married couples and 15 long term married couples (> 5years) from different cultural backgrounds, with the administration of marital satisfaction scale and the overall life satisfaction scales and a comprehensive psychoanalytic interview in order to bring out the subtle nature of the human emotions resent in each of the partners. The results showed that there was only moderate decrease in the marital satisfaction amongst both the groups The effects of other correlated factors such as affluence, gender, family background and the level of education were carefully examined.