The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work

Chapter 1

Inside the Seattle Love Lab: The Truth about Happy Marriages

It's a surprisingly cloudless Seattle morning as newlyweds Mark and Janice Gordon sit down tobreakfast. Outside the apartment's picture window, the waters of Montlake cut a deep-blue swath, while runners jog and geese waddle along the lakeside park. Mark and Janice are enjoying the view as they munch on theirFrench toast and share the Sunday paper. Later Mark will probably switch on the football game while Janice chats over the phone with her mom in St.Louis.

All seems ordinary enough inside this studio apartment--until you notice the three video cameras bolted to the wall, the microphones clipped talk-show style to Mark's and Janice's collars, and the Holter monitors strapped around their chests. Mark and Janice's lovely studio with a view is really not their apartment at all. It's alaboratory at the University of Washington in Seattle, where for sixteen years I have spearheaded the most extensive and innovative research ever into marriage anddivorce.

As part of one of these studies, Mark and Janice (as well as forty-nine other randomly selected couples)volunteered to stay overnight in our fabricated apartment, affectionately known as the Love Lab. Their instructions were to act as naturally as possible, despite my team of scientists observing them from behind the one-waykitchen mirror, the cameras recording their every word and facial expression, and the sensors tracking bodily signs of stress or relaxation, such as how quickly their hearts pound. (To preserve basic privacy, the coupleswere monitored only from nine a.m. to nine p.m. and never while in the bathroom.) The apartment comes equipped with a fold-out sofa, a working kitchen, a phone, TV, VCR, and CD player. Couples were told to bring theirgroceries, their newspapers, their laptops, needlepoint, hand weights, even their pets--whatever they would need to experience a typicalweekend.

My goal has been nothing more ambitious than to uncover the truth about marriage--to finally answer the questionsthat have puzzled people for so long: Why is marriage so tough at times? Why do some lifelong relationships click, while others just tick away like a time bomb? And how can you prevent a marriage from going bad--or rescueone that already has?

Predicting Divorce with 91 Percent Accuracy

After years of research I can finally answer these questions. In fact, I am now able to predict whether a couple will stayhappily together or lose their way. I can make this prediction after listening to the couple interact in our Love Lab for as little as five minutes My accuracy rate in these predictions averages 91 percent over threeseparate studies. In other words, in 91 percent of the cases where I have predicted that a couple's marriage would eventually fail or succeed, time has proven me right. These predictions are not based on my intuition orpreconceived notions of what marriage should be, but on the data I've accumulated over years ofstudy.

At first you might be tempted to shrug off my research results as just another in a long line of newfangledtheories. It's certainly

Drawing on groundbreaking research into the dynamics of healthy relationships, a study of the basic principles that make up a happy, long-lasting marriage shares easy-to-understand, helpful advice on how to cope with such issues as work, children, money, sex, and stress. 35,000 first printing. Tour.

Chapter 1

Inside the Seattle Love Lab: The Truth about Happy Marriages

It's a surprisingly cloudless Seattle morning as newlyweds Mark and Janice Gordon sit down to breakfast. Outside the apartment's picture window, the waters of Montlak

John M. Gottman, Ph.D., is the founder and director of the Seattle Marital and Family Institute and a professor of psychology at the University of Washington. His previous books include The Heart of Parenting and Why Marriages Succeed or Fail.

Former magazine editor Nan Silver is a writer living in New Jersey.