Long-Term Trajectories of Marital Adjustment in Israeli Couples Over Decades: Does Gender Matter?

This study explored trajectories of marital adjustment, including overall, affection, satisfaction, cohesion and consensus, in 197 middle-aged Israeli spouses who had been married for an average of 34 years. As military conscription in Israel is mandatory, all men in this study are military veterans. The main aims of the study were to explore the trajectories of marital adjustment over time and to describe similarities and differences in the marital adjustment of husbands and wives. Assessments were done at three time points over 12 years and were analyzed using a latent growth mixture model. Findings showed that overall husbands and wives reported being generally satisfied in their marriage. Different trajectories for husbands and wives were found in most domains of marital adjustment. The majority of wives reported a sharper decline in satisfaction over time, while more husbands reported an increase in affection. The wives reported more variability, as well as higher levels of consensus than their husbands across the 12 years of the study and the three data collection points. The spouses’ high level of cohesion served to support their high levels of marital adjustment. Implications of these findings are discussed.