POLICE AND MARITAL BEHAVIOR 1 *******Do not cite or reproduce without permission********* Job Stress and Dyadic Synchrony in Police Marriages: A Preliminary Investigation

Despite reports documenting adverse effects of stress on police marriages, few empirical studies focus on actual emotional behaviors of officers and spouses. In this preliminary investigation, 17 male police officers and their non-police wives completed daily stress diaries for one week and then participated in a laboratory-based discussion about their respective days. Conversations were video-recorded and coded for specific emotional behaviors reflecting hostility and affection, which are strong predictors of marital outcomes. We examined associations between officers’ job stress (per diaries and the Police Stress Survey) and couples’ emotional behavior (mean levels and behavioral synchrony) using a dyadic repeated measures design capitalizing on the large number of observations available for each couple (1020 observations). When officers reported more job stress, they showed less hostility, less synchrony with their wives’ hostility, and more synchrony with their wives’ affection; their wives showed greater synchrony with officers’ hostility and less synchrony with officers’ affection. Therefore, for officers, greater job stress was associated with less behavioral negativity, potentially less attunement to wives’ negativity, but potentially greater attunement to wives’ affection—perhaps a compensatory strategy or attempt to buffer their marriage from stress. These attempts may be less effective, however, if, as our synchrony findings may suggest, wives are focusing on officers’ hostility rather than affection. Although it will be important to replicate these results given the small sample, our findings reveal that patterns of behavioral synchrony may be a key means to better understand how job stress exacts a toll on police marriages. POLICE AND MARITAL BEHAVIOR 3 Job Stress and Dyadic Synchrony in Police Marriages: A Preliminary Investigation Emotional engagement and a balance of positive to negative emotion are essential for a marriage to thrive. High levels of hostile expressions (e.g., criticism) and low levels of affection expressions (e.g., shared humor) are particularly strong predictors of marital distress and divorce (Gottman, 1994; Gottman & Levenson, 1992; Lindahl, Clements, & Markman, 1998). Highly “emotionally neutral” interactions also can be problematic, signaling “a devitalized, essentially affectless marriage” on a similar, although slower path toward divorce (Gottman & Levenson, 2002, p. 92). Coordination or synchrony between partners’ behaviors provides an important index of emotional engagement or attunement and reveals how partners’ momentary behaviors may translate into a larger emotional dynamic and relationship functioning (Bernieri & Rosenthal, 1991; Butner, Diamond, & Hicks, 2007; Rohrbaugh, et al., 2009). A potential threat to maintaining a positive, emotionally-rewarding marital climate is job stress. Engaging in meaningful, coordinated emotional interactions requires effort, and stress depletes cognitive, emotional, and regulatory resources needed for such effort (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Muraven, & Tice, 1998). Spouses report lower mood, and in turn less desire for physical and emotional closeness, on days of greater work stress (Lavee & Ben-Ari, 2007). Per selfand partner-reports, husbands in particular tend to disengage emotionally—including expressing less anger—after high workload (Repetti, 1989) or negatively arousing workdays (Schulz, Cowan, Cowan, & Brennan, 2004). Given that reports of behaviors do not consistently coincide with actual behaviors, particularly with respect to marital functioning (Fincham & Rogge, 2010), we were interested in studying associations between job stress and couples’ actual emotional behaviors. We investigated this in male police officers and their non-police wives. POLICE AND MARITAL BEHAVIOR 4 For several decades, police work has been described as precipitating marital distress (Niederhoffer & Niederhoffer, 1979; Stratton, 1975; Violanti, 2007). Law enforcement is physically and emotionally exhausting (Senjo & Dhungana, 2009; Maslach & Jackson, 1981). It requires “emotion management”—suppressing personal feelings and expressing emotions not actually felt—even among fellow officers (Pogrebin & Poole, 1988, 1993; Schaible & Gecas, 2010; Tracy, 2005). Similarly, officers may hide their true feelings at home. In a large survey of police wives, “keep things to self” was cited as officers’ most frequently-used strategy for combating work-induced stress (Alexander & Walker, 1996). Despite officers’ best efforts to prevent police work from affecting their marriage, their spouses likely are affected, as partners’ stress and emotions are closely linked (Burke & Mikkelsen, 2004; Lavee & Ben-Ari, 2007; Thompson & Bolger, 1999). For this and a prior study, 19 male police officers and their wives completed daily stress diaries for one week and then visited our laboratory where they engaged in a 15-minute conversation about their respective days . The conversation was video-recorded and physiological responses were monitored continuously using small, unobtrusive electrodes attached to each participant’s chest, ear, and non-dominant hand. A movement detection sensor also was placed under each participant’s chair. Participants subsequently watched a videorecording of their conversation and provided continuous self-ratings of positive and negative emotional experience. In an initial paper, we reported results of self-rated emotion and physiological data from these couples (Roberts & Levenson, 2001). We found that greater officer job stress was associated with higher self-ratings of negative emotional experience and lower self-ratings of positive emotional experience for officers; lower self-ratings of both positive and negative emotional experience for wives; and decreased body movement but greater POLICE AND MARITAL BEHAVIOR 5 cardiovascular arousal for both partners. Therefore, partners’ internal emotional state suggested greater tension, reduced positive emotion, and, for wives, possible “numbing” of emotions when officers reported greater job stress. A question remained, however, regarding how couples expressed their emotions at times of increased officer stress. To address this issue, for the present study, we obtained measures of couples’ observable emotional behavior. Behavior is a key source of information regarding how stress may exact a toll on marriage. We examined displays of hostility and affection (each a composite of several specific behaviors; see Method), as these reflect two poles of couples’ emotional lives and are strong predictors of marital outcomes. We coded behaviors in 30-second increments, allowing us to test our hypotheses using a dyadic repeated measures approach that capitalizes on the large number of observations available for each couple. We examined mean levels of behavior and partners’ behavioral synchrony. Based on previous research suggesting stress is associated with positive and negative emotional disengagement—perhaps due to depletion, tendency to hide stress and emotions, and/or attempts to protect one’s marriage from stress (Lavee & Ben-Ari, 2007)—and given that withdrawal or suppression of emotions can disrupt the interaction for both partners (Butler, et al., 2003)—we hypothesized that when officers reported more job stress (rated in daily diaries and on a questionnaire measuring police stress), officers and their wives would show: (1) fewer displays of hostility behaviors, (2) fewer displays of affection behaviors, and (3) less synchrony of hostility and affection behaviors (i.e., partners’ hostility or affection would be less predicted by one another’s displays of hostility or affection, respectively).