Changes in Relationship Commitment Across the Transition to Parenthood: Pre-pregnancy Happiness as a Protective Resource

Frontiers in Psychology

Catrin Finkenauer¹  Hagar Ter Kuile²  Esther S. Kluwer³  Tanja van der Lippe⁴ 

[1] Department of Interdisciplinary Social Science, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands;Department of Social, Health & Organisational Psychology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands;Department of Social, Health & Organisational Psychology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands;Behavioral Science Institute, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands;Department of Sociology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands;

关键词: transition to parenthood;    commitment;    happiness;    vulnerability-stress-adaptation model;    actor-partner interdependence model;    Mplus;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2021.622160

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

The transition to parenthood is both a joyous and a challenging event in a relationship. Studies to date have found mostly negative effects of the birth of the first child on the parental relationship. We propose that partners' pre-pregnancy individual happiness may serve as a buffer against these negative effects. We predicted that parents who are happy prior to pregnancy fare better in terms of relationship commitment after childbirth than unhappy parents. To test our prediction, we used data of a 5-wave longitudinal study among 109 Dutch newlywed couples who had their first child during the study and a comparison group of 55 couples who remained childless. We found that the relationship commitment of fathers with higher pre-pregnancy happiness and fathers with a partner with higher pre-pregnancy happiness increased slightly in the years after childbirth, whereas the relationship commitment of fathers with lower pre-pregnancy happiness and fathers with a partner with lower pre-pregnancy happiness decreased. In addition, the relationship commitment of mothers with a happier partner prior to pregnancy decreased only slightly across the transition to parenthood but showed a steeper decline for mothers with a partner with average or lower pre-pregnancy happiness. In line with the idea that happiness acts as a resource when partners have to deal with relationship challenges, individual happiness predicted changes in relationship commitment for parents, but not for partners who remained childless.

【 授权许可】

CC BY