Impulsivity, communication, and marital satisfaction in newlywed couples

The authors used a vulnerability-stress-adaptation framework to examine how and why impulsivity affects communication and marital satisfaction in a sample of 100 newlywed couples. We specifically examined the links between impulsivity and perceptions of conflict communication patterns and their associations with marital satisfaction. Using an actor-partner interdependence framework, the results demonstrated that impulsivity was negatively associated with one's own and partner's marital satisfaction. Impulsivity was also negatively associated with constructive communication and positively associated with destructive communication. Furthermore, mediation analyses showed that communication patterns mediated the impulsivity-satisfaction link. Taken together, these findings suggest that impulsivity is likely to lead to lower marital satisfaction, partly through its effect on communication between partners.