Repair Attempts
Peer-Reviewed
Any word, action, or gesture intended to de-escalate tension during conflict.
Any word, action, or gesture intended to de-escalate tension during conflict. Can be serious ("I'm sorry, I got defensive"), simple ("Can we take a break?"), or even silly. In healthy relationships, repair attempts are made and received. In distressed relationships, they're either not made or are rejected because negative sentiment has taken over. The ability to repair is one of the strongest predictors of relationship health.
Evidence
Peer-Reviewed
Repair attempts, the bids to de-escalate during conflict through humor, a softer tone or taking responsibility, earn Peer-Reviewed as a descriptive Gottman construct. They are observable, codable behaviors from the Love Lab program, and whether they are made and accepted tracks with how well couples recover from conflict (Specific Affect Coding System; Heyman, 2001). The rating is for the descriptive science, not the separate marketed claim that repair behavior predicts divorce with high accuracy.
Origin
John Gottman
Sources
- The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work — John Gottman, 1999