Review the article, "Does Marriage and Relationship Education Work? A Meta-Analytic Study," and provide a brief summary of the issues related to disadvantaged and ethnically diverse populations.
The overall results of the study are promising, however, the issues mentioned in the article require further research with the involvement of a wide range of participants. The results of the study revealed that the Marriage and relationship education (MRE) has a positive impact on the overall relationship within white middle class people. (Baldwin, Blanchard, Fawcett &Hawkins, 2008) The research has been conducted using psychoeducational intervention only, in order to receive a clear picture of the results. The researchers excluded the therapeutic interventions because of its greater effect on people’s behavior. In order to conduct a research 502 studies by the Urban Institute, Dissertation Abstracts, documents of PsycINFO, bibliographies, unpublished reports were studied. (Baldwin, Blanchard, Fawcett &Hawkins, 2008). Researchers used self reports and observations in order to complete the analysis. The main findings of the study are: the MRE has equal impact both on men and women, programs of 9 – 20 hours have a stronger effect on the couples, MRE has modest but significant effects on couples, especially in the development of communication skills, however provide a very slight effect on the increase of the quality of relationship. (Baldwin, Blanchard, Fawcett &Hawkins, 2008)
Disadvantaged and ethnically diverse populations have not been included in the article sufficiently due to lack of information and studies conducted in order to examine these groups. As a result, in order to implement the MRE on the governmental level, it is highly important to conduct researches including a different range of populations. The governmental programs are directed specifically at disadvantaged groups, as those more likely have a risk of appearance of relationship issues. In addition, it has already been studied that the groups with a higher risk of divorce benefit from these programs more than those with the smaller risk. (Baldwin, Blanchard, Fawcett &Hawkins, 2008) Moreover, more research should be provided for these groups as according to statistics half of the Americans are building the relationship with the partner who has already been married. (Baldwin, Blanchard, Fawcett &Hawkins, 2008)
How would you as a researcher increase participation of disadvantaged and ethnically diverse populations in marriage and relationship education programs?
In order to attract people to marriage and education programs process one should offer benefits for each and every group. Taking into account cultural/religion diversity, it is important to find the personal approach to such couples taking into account cultural difference in discussing the marital/relationship issues. First of all, such programs should be available for these groups (online projects, invitations, e-mails, and personal inquiries.) Programs should offer the benefit for these populations: ability advance relationship, improve its quality, find a way to resolve conflicts, forgive, take the responsibility for the marriage duties. Studies should also be confidential and take into account the personal, cultural/religious features of each couple. Other offers can be included, such as public meetings, lectures, presentation of the given project in order to conduct a research which would help further populations to advance own relationships and bring it to the higher level.
In order to increase the participation of such groups it is important to:
Take into account cultural diversity, provide strict confidentiality, arrange the announcement of the given program and invite people by means of online letters, hand in invitations, oral speeches, and personal inquiries, offer the benefit of increasing the quality of relationship and the quality of family life accordingly, ability to provide studies for the chosen cultural group.
What types of measures and data collection methods would you employ to obtain more reliable and generalizable results?
Types of measures:
Nominal scale: divide the groups by ethnicity/religion views, divorced, time spent is a relationship, whether the couple has kids or not.
Ordinal scale: the level of relationship satisfaction before and after the studies, the ability to resolve issues, forgive, regulate conflicts. The scale of improvements before/during/after the experiment
Data collection methods: interview, self-reports, observational reports and surveys to be completed on the above mentioned criteria.
References
Baldwin S.A., Blanchard V.L., Fawcett E.B., & Hawkins A.J. (2008). Does Marriage and Relationship Education Work? A Meta-Analytic Study. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. Vol. 76, No. 5, 723–734. DOI: 10.1037/a0012584
