The importance of investing in your relationship: Emotional capital and responses to partner transgressions

Abstract

Throughout their relationship, couples experience a myriad of small positive moments together, such as sharing leisure activities or laughing with one another. Although these moments may seem trivial in isolation, growing research suggests that accumulating positive moments together helps couples build emotional capital, which can buffer them from the harmful consequences of relationship difficulties. The current study examined two potential mechanisms, relationship attributions and forgiveness, for this buffering effect. Newlywed couples reported their relationships attributions and forgiveness tendencies and completed a 10-day daily diary task assessing emotional capital, negative partner behaviors, and marital satisfaction. Consistent with previous research, spouses who reported accumulating more emotional capital on average across the diary task exhibited a weaker association between their partners’ daily negative behaviors and their daily satisfaction. Extending prior work, path analyses revealed a significant indirect effect of emotional capital on reactivity through relationship attributions and forgiveness. That is, spouses who reported more emotional capital tended to make more benevolent and forgiving interpretations of their partners’ behaviors, which in turn predicted reduced reactivity to partners’ transgressions. These findings contribute to a growing literature illuminating the critical role everyday shared positive moments may play in enhancing relationship well-being.