Poll: Most Marriages Are Happy

    Everyone who marries has a common goal: a good relationship. No one expects to divorce. But defining what makes a successful marriage can be complex.        

“I think for most people, a smart marriage is a permanent commitment of complimentary people to one another,” said Beau Weston, Ph.D., a professor of sociology from Centre College in Kentucky, who specializes in marriage and family life.       

Weston said that for most people, marriage is to vow to join together and the “seal and cement” of the promise is having children. “In general, most people marry and have kids. Normally, the happiest people in society are married parents. They are most economically productive. They are really the pillars and backbone in society,” Weston said.       

Happiness may come from being grateful for the positive effect marriage can have on one’s life, he said. “Knowing that you are doing a good and uplifting thing is meaningful.” 


DEFINING A HAPPY MARRIAGE      

There are a variety of fundamentals that make marriages successful. According to results from a GfK Roper poll, people believe a successful marriage will be a happy one. Most people believe that a good marriage is defined as being happy at least 75 percent of the time. About 17 percent of people believe a couple should happy more than half the time. Just one percent think of marriage as successful if the couple is happy 25 percent of the time.       

The people who responded to the poll seem to find themselves in happy marriages. Most of them, 75 percent, said they are happy at least  three-quarters of the time. About 15 percent said they are happy at least half the time. Just 5 percent said they are never happy in their marriages.       

The poll was conducted was conducted by the independent research firm for Divorce360.com. GFK Roper polled more than 1,500 people in September. The polling sample was made up of about 55 percent women and 45 percent men. The margin of error for the study is plus- or minus-2.6 percent.       

Other than evaluating how often the couple is happy, successful marriages seem to include some commonalities. The husband and wife know themselves and know what they want from the relationship. The couple communicates well and knows how to repair from a fight. The couple has a sense of equality and teamwork in the relationship. They also foster an emotionally and sexually intimate relationship.


AWARENESS OF EMOTIONAL HEALTH

Beatty Cohan, who has been a practicing psychotherapist for more than 32 years and is based in Sarasota, Fla., said that a good marriages begin with  healthy individuals. She said one must be psychologically strong before building a strong relationship. The relationship is also unlikely to thrive if the individuals do not repair the emotional issues that were problematic in previous relationships.“Your marriage is going to be a disaster,” Cohan said.       

Sally Dear, who teaches about relationship issues at Binghamton University, also said that people need to understand how a previous relationship derailed. “People are afraid,”  Dear said. “They don’t want that history to repeat themselves.”       

Dear teaches a class about divorce and relationships called "Divorce Culture: Relationships and Developmental Issues." She often hears from studentswho are children of divorce and who have found their way to meaningful, successful relationships. She attributes that to the learning about what makes relationships successful.“With the proper awareness and education, I really think that we could significantly decrease that trend of if you come from a divorced family, you are likely to get divorced,” Dear said.