Infidelity in Couples Seeking
Marital Therapy
David C. Atkins
Travis Research Institute
Fuller Graduate School of Psychology
Jean Yi
University of Washington
Donald H. Baucom
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Andrew Christensen
University of California, Los Angeles
An electronic version of this paper was send by Dr. Atkins to the Zur Institute for the
exclusive purpose of being included in the Infidelity online course.
This is a pre-publication draft of a paper that was later published as:
Atkins, D. C., Yi, J., Baucom, D. H., & Christensen, A. (2005). Infidelity in couples
seeking marital therapy. Journal of Family Psychology, 19, 470-473.
Journal web site:
http://www.apa.org/journals/fam/
.
Copyright by American Psychological Association. This article may not exactly
replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.
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Abstract
The revelation of an affair is often an emotionally explosive event for a couple, yet little is
known about specific individual and relationship factors that accompany infidelity. The present
study examined the qualities of individuals and couples that differentiate couples with (n = 19)
and without (n = 115) infidelity using couples from a randomized clinical trial of marital therapy.
Findings indicated that couples with infidelity showed greater marital instability, dishonesty,
arguments about trust, narcissism, and time spent apart. Gender also proved to be a significant
moderator of several effects. Men who had participated in affairs showed increased substance
use, were older, and were more sexually dissatisfied. Results offer initial clues to concomitants
of affairs for couple therapists.
Key Words: Infidelity, Marital Therapy, Extramarital Involvement
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Infidelity in Couples Seeking Marital Therapy
Representative national surveys have found that approximately 20% to 25% of
Americans report at least one extramarital sexual encounter during their lives (Atkins, Baucom,
& Jacobson, 2001; Laumann, Gagnon, Michael, & Michaels, 1994). Yet, there has been
relatively little research focused on factors associated with infidelity among couples seeking
therapy. Research from the national surveys show that poor marital satisfaction is related to
higher rates of infidelity, and more men than women have participated in infidelity; however,
this relationship is strongly dependent on the age of the participant (Atkins et al., 2001). Other
research also supports gender differences in affairs, demonstrating that men described their
affairs as more sexual than emotional, whereas women described their affairs as more emotional
than sexual (Glass & Wright, 1985). Other variables (e.g., education, religiousness, opportunity)
are inconsistently related to infidelity (for a review, see Allen, Atkins, Baucom, Snyder, Gordon,
& Glass, 2004).
Buss and Shackelford (1997), in a study using young married couples who estimated their
likelihood of future infidelity, found that conscientiousness, religiosity, and marital satisfaction
are negatively related to potential infidelity and that openness to experience, narcissism,
impulsivity, social naïveté, alcohol consumption, discrepant “mate-value” (i.e., attractiveness) as
rated by interviewers, and sexual dissatisfaction are all positively related to potential infidelity.
Thus, although the topic of infidelity has generated a significant amount of theoretical
and clinical speculation and some empirical examination (see Allen et al., 2004), the particular
factors—both individual and couple—related to infidelity in couple therapy remain nebulous.
The present study focused on qualities of individuals and couples that may differentiate
distressed couples who have experienced an affair from other distressed couples seeking
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treatment who have not experienced infidelity. As such, these factors may represent the
hallmark qualities of infidelity that set it apart from other problems in couple therapy.
Method
Participants
The current data come from an ongoing study of marital therapy (Christensen, Atkins,
Berns, Wheeler, Baucom, & Simpson, 2004). Participants in this study are 134 heterosexual,
married couples who sought therapy for marital problems. Couples were randomly assigned to
Traditional Behavioral Couple Therapy (Jacobson & Margolin, 1978) or Integrative Behavioral
Couple Therapy (Jacobson & Christensen, 1996) and received up to 26 sessions at no cost.
Nineteen couples (14.2% of the total sample) had at least one partner with a reported infidelity.
Only those measures and procedures directly relevant to the present study are addressed here.
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At their initial visit to the lab, couples completed a variety of measures that assessed their
relationship (i.e., Dyadic Adjustment Scale, Spanier, 1976; Frequency and Acceptability of
Partner Behavior, Christensen & Jacobson, 1997; Marital Satisfaction Inventory – Revised,
Snyder, 1997; Marital Status Inventory, Weiss & Cerreto, 1980; Problem Areas Questionnaire,
Heavey, Layne, & Christensen, 1993) and individual functioning and psychopathology (i.e.,
NEO–Five Factor Inventory, Costa & McCrae, 1992; COMPASS, Howard, Brill, Lueger,
O’Mahoney, & Grissom, 1993; Structured Clinical Interview of the DSM-IV, First, Spitzer,
Gibbon, & Williams, 1995).
After the completion of treatment, therapists completed a questionnaire for every couple
with an affair that they counseled; this questionnaire assessed various aspects of the affair (e.g.,
which partner had the affair, length of the affair, when the affair began, when the affair was
revealed, number of known affairs, degree of physical involvement, degree of emotional
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involvement, percentage of time in therapy spent on the affair, etc.). Some questions were based
on items from Glass and Wright (1992) and Buss and Shackelford (1997).
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Data Analysis
The data present several challenges for statistical analysis, including the non-
independence of spouse’s data and the infrequency of infidelity leading to low power and a risk
of over-fitting the data, which could lead to poor generalization of the results. Moreover, these
issues are compounded by the exploratory nature of the research. We implemented the following
statistical procedures to ensure meaningful inferences based on the statistical analyses: logistic
regression using a robust estimate of the variance-covariance matrix that incorporates the
clustered nature of the data, a cross-validation procedure that is based on the bootstrap to assess
possible over-fitting, and a method for selecting and consolidating candidate predictors that
incorporates clinical and statistical reasoning (Harrell, 2001; Harrell et al., 1998).
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Results
Infidelity Couples
Couples were not randomized to treatment based on affair status and hence, almost two-
thirds of couples with affairs received Traditional Behavioral Couple Therapy; slightly more than
50% of involved spouses were males. There was considerable variation in the duration of the
affair relationship (Mdn = 6 months) with the great majority of affairs beginning prior to therapy.
Interestingly, only about one-third of affairs were revealed prior to beginning therapy and one-
quarter were never revealed to the spouse during therapy.
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Most involved spouses had a single
affair involving sexual intercourse and moderate emotional involvement. The time in therapy
spent on the affair varied notably (Mdn = 20%), which is weighted by the cases in which the
affair was never brought up in therapy and no therapy time was spent on it.