Understanding Couple Relationship Education: Examining Mechanisms of Change

Background: Couple relationship education (CRE) programs have demonstrated mixed effects, and our inadequate understanding of the mechanisms underlying CRE may contribute to these effects. The existing theory underpinning CRE posits that participation should lead to the acquisition of communication and conflict managements skills, driving improved communication between coupled partners, which should lead to changes in more distal couple-functioning outcomes such as relationship satisfaction. However, there is a dearth of research testing this theory. In addition, CRE curricula provide content on other relationship skills that could improve relationship-oriented, cognitive-behavioral constructs such as trust or intimacy. However, no evaluations have tested a theory of change that incorporates these cognitive-behavioral constructs. Method: This research explores the current theory of change using the dataset from the Building Strong Families project, a large-scale experimental evaluation of CRE programs which includes baseline, 15- , and 36-month self-reported surveys from participants. Actor-partner independence mediation modeling is used to examine whether positive and negative conflict management (CM) skills and relationship-oriented, cognitive-behavioral variables related to support and affection (SA) at 15-months mediate the association between CRE assignment and couple-functioning outcomes (satisfaction, stability, infidelity, co-parenting, and intimate partner violence) at 36-months. This project also explores whether CM skills at 15-months mediate the effect of CRE assignment on measures of SA at 36-months and vice versa. Results: CM skills did not mediate the effects of CRE assignment on any couple-functioning outcomes, and the same was true of SA behaviors. In addition, SA behaviors did not mediate the effects of CRE assignment on CM skills. This was also the case for CM skills mediating the effects of CRE assignment on measures of SA at 36-months. Discussion: This study contributes to the literature on CRE’s existing theory of change and represents the first study to examine mediating mechanisms in a large-scale experimental evaluation of CRE programs for low-income unmarried couples. Although significant mediation was not observed, this finding is consistent with a previous study examining the theory in another large-scale evaluation. Several limitations may have contributed to the lack of significant findings. Recommendations for future research exploring this topic are discussed.