Relationship between Empathy, Forgiveness and Marital Adjustment in Couples

Abstract

Introduction: Marital adjustment is gaining increasing concern in the modern society. Marital adjustment is a process during which partners in a marriage change and adapt to their new roles accompanying each other acting as a team different to two separate units. Levels of empathy and levels of forgiveness could be factors in determining a relationship with marital adjustment. Marital adjustment is an important predictor and factors like empathy and forgiveness that enhance the marital quality and marital satisfaction in a marriage can be studied as mediators of marital adjustment. High levels of empathy will have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. High levels of forgiveness will have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. Focusing on forgiveness and empathy as having a positive relationship with marital adjustment, it can be said the ability to forgive a partner and the willingness to grant forgiveness is on of the most important contributors to marital adjustment. Empathy between couples means having the ability to feel and understand the thoughts and emotions of the other partner. Having the ability to listen to and relating to the partner’s feelings is very important and this has a great impact on how the relationship works thereby affecting the levels of adjustment. Methods: The current study aimed at studying the relationship between empathy, forgiveness and marital adjustment in couples. The study was conducted on 80 married individuals, i.e, 40 married males and40 married females. It was hypothesized that higher levels of forgiveness would have a positive relationship with marital adjustment; higher levels of empathy would have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. It was also hypothesized that there would be significant gender differences in regard of forgiveness and empathy between couples. Results & Implications: The study reported that higher levels of empathy have a positive relationship with marital adjustment. On the dimensions of forgiveness also the study reported a positive relationship between forgiveness and marital adjustment. There were significant gender differences between males and females on the domains of empathy and forgiveness in a marital relationship. The study provides an opportunity for further research across age and gender to uncover the possible differences or similarities that may be present. Also it adds to the already existing data pool with equivocal studies.