Interpersonal Relationships - Changing over the years?

Did you know that in America, approximately 38% of couples aged between 20 and 24 are getting divorced? When compared to Singapore, which is only 10%, this is an immense difference. Reading an article on www.women.timesonline.co.uk that talked about “What couples argue about - then and now”, I thought about the role of communication in relationships by DeFleur et al; the 3 processes.

The article is about “Relate, the nation's largest provider of relationship counselling” (which is celebrating its 70th birthday this month), analysing its archive data and comparing it with current notes and statistics. “It began offering counselling in 1943, and in the first five years saw more than 8,000 clients. But marital crises proliferated: in 1942, there were 12,000 petitions for divorce; by 1947 this had more than trebled to 50,000. Our current divorce figure is around 149,000, says the latest confirmed government research”.

In Relates earlier days, it was noted that a lot of the problems were to do with “Bad sex, jealousy, interfering in-laws, suicidal husbands, loose wives and spouses hiding in boxrooms”. However, in current trends, it has been observed that “One fundamental change since the Forties is the trend away from marriage towards cohabitation”. Two other major factors in changes that are likely to impose reason for more conflicts are “working lives and technology”. For instance, “Nowadays both members of a couple are probably working, so that creates pressures on both sides of the relationship, and problems with finding balance.”

As this article focuses on the results of 70 years of “Marriage Guidance Counselling”, it targets mainly the Relational Dissolution process (the last stage of 3 processes) by DeFleur. Some of the relational challenges about in this article are differences, boredom, change, poor communication skills, unrealistic expectations and especially actions that undermine trust.

It is clear that over the years, the elements of the 3 processes by DeFleur have changed gradually when looked into on a deeper level which is demonstrated by the differences mentioned above. Even though the Engagement stage involves the general idea of exchanging phone numbers, hanging out to get to know each other, and in turn getting together as an item, a lot of the context is different. With modern technology it’s harder for girls to subtly brush-off guys by simply giving them a fake phone number, because now with the invention of the hand phone they tend to “check” the number by giving it a missed call. To get the interest of another is complex as there is more than one aspect to base upon, some of which are physical appearance, similarity, proximity and complementarities.

As always, the Maintaining Stage is difficult and requires a lot of attention, patience, and understanding. This stage is where most of the self disclosure occurs naturally, conflict is bound to happen, and relational needs are to be met either by satisfying them or coming to a mutual understanding. Over the years so much change has developed through interpersonal communications that different cultural beliefs have merged to produce an even more diverse society.

Therefore, as illustrated the casualness of counselling and divorce is now a widely accepted topic in comparison to earlier years where “counselling itself was thought at the time to be rather absurd. You had to be careful when people asked what you did for a living. Many people thought it was ridiculous - that you were a quack”.




Article Link : http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/relationships/article4786340.ece