title: Marital stability, satisfaction and well-being in old age: variability and continuity in long-term continuously married older persons.
abstract: Recent research shows that the well-documented positive effects of marital stability on well-being and health outcomes are conditional upon the quality of marriage. To date, few studies have explored the relationship between marital satisfaction, well-being and health among very long-term married individuals. This study aims at identifying groups of long-term married persons with respect to marital satisfaction and comparing them longitudinally concerning their well-being outcomes, marital stressors, personality and socio-demographic variables.
  
  
  
  Data are derived from a survey (data collection 2012 and 2014) with 374 continuously married individuals at wave 1 (mean age: 74.2 years, length of marriage: 49.2 years) and 252 at wave 2. Cluster analyses were performed comparing the clusters with regard to various well-being outcomes. The predictive power of cluster affiliation and various predictors at wave 1 on well-being outcomes at wave 2 was tested using regression analyses.
  
  
  
  Two groups were identified, one happily the other unhappily married, with the happily married scoring higher on all well-being and health outcomes. Regression analyses revealed that group affiliation at wave 1 was not any longer predictive of health, emotional loneliness and hopelessness two years later, when taking into account socio-demographic variables, psychological resilience and marital strain, whereas it remained an important predictor of life satisfaction and social loneliness.
  
  
  
  Marital satisfaction is associated with health and well-being in older couples over time, whereas psychological resilience and marital strain are major predictors explaining the variance of these outcomes.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , University of Bern , Bern , Switzerland.
authors.forename: Katja
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Margelisch
authors.affiliation: b Department of Psychology , Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich , Munich , Germany.
authors.forename: Klaus A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Schneewind
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , University of Bern , Bern , Switzerland.
authors.forename: Jeanine
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Violette
authors.affiliation: a Department of Psychology , University of Bern , Bern , Switzerland.
authors.forename: Pasqualina
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Perrig-Chiello
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005191:Family Characteristics; D005260:Female; D015577:Geriatric Assessment / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006240:Happiness; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D017533:Marital Status; D008393:Marriage / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008603:Mental Health; D008875:Middle Aged; D010549:Personal Satisfaction; D018454:Spouses / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D013557:Switzerland
keywords: marital satisfaction; marital stability; marital status; old age; well-being