PSYCHOLOGICAL FLOURISHING OF MARRIED INDIVIDUALS: ROLE OF COMMUNAL ORIENTATION, EMOTIONAL EXPRESSIVITY AND EMOTIONAL REGULATION

Abstract

The present research sheds light on understanding the psychological flourishing among married individuals. Further, the role of communal orientation, emotional expressivity and emotional regulation was explained within the theoretical framework of Broaden and Built Theory. It was assumed that communal orientation (positive and negative) is a predictor of psychological flourishing (relationship dimension and individual dimension) of married individuals. Emotional expressivity (positive, negative and impulse strength) may play role of mediator and emotional regulation (cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression) as moderator may play significant role in relationship between communal orientation and psychological flourishing. Detailed review of literature during the present study had shown that there is scarcity of established studies that high lights the variables that determine psychological flourishing of marital relationship within collectivistic culture, hence the present study concentrated on the relationship thriving variables that might enhance psychological flourishing of marital relationship within a collectivist and eastern culture. Present empirical study was divided into three phases. Specific objectives were outlined for every phase; and objectives were fulfilled through numerous steps and stages in each phase. Detailed review of existing literature done in the present study depicted that there is scarcity of measuring tool to operationalize psychological flourishing from the perspective of married individuals. Therefore, Phase I was planned for the development of indigenous instrument to measure psychological flourishing of Pakistani married individuals. This phase was divided into numerous steps and stages. Initially, qualitative exploration of psychological flourishing construct was performed through Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and semi-structured interviews using questions guideline prepared for present viii study. Married individuals belonging to various cities of Pakistan participated in FGDs and semi-structured interviews and provided rich information about indicators of flourishing related to marital relationship in collectivistic culture. Qualitative data gained through was subjected to Thematic Analysis that generated diverse culture specific and universal themes indicative of psychological flourishing within marital relationship. Emerged themes were then utilized to develop item pool for psychological flourishing scale. Items were finalized through a panel of experts who finalized the items according to content relevance and language comprehension. Phase I also dealt with exploratory factor analysis (n= 303) of the developed scale which resulted in two-factor model of psychological flourishing scale for the married sample; labeled as Relationship Dimension and Individual Dimension. Phase II of present research focused on translation, adaptation and confirmation of factor structure (using AMOS-21) of already developed scales i.e. Communal Orientation Scale, Berkeley Expressivity Questionnaire and Emotional Regulation Questionnaire used to asses’ relationship of study variables. Confirmation of factor structure aimed to establish construct validity of study measures. Descriptive properties (mean, standard deviations, reliability coefficients, Skewness, and kurtosis) and preliminary relationship trends (correlations) of the study variables were also explored in Phase II (n=300) using SPSS-22. Findings of Phase II concluded that all study instruments are reliable and valid and are ready to be used in the main study. Phase III was aimed to test numerous theory based hypotheses that aimed to explore the relationship of communal orientation, emotional expressivity and emotional regulation in understanding psychological flourishing of married individuals (n= 1002). Role of demographics such as of age, gender, education, profession, duration of marriage, family system, and type of marriage were also explored in terms of study scales ix and their subscales. Linear regression, mediation, moderation, moderated-mediation models, independent sample t-test, and model testing were performed. Results indicated significant relationship among predictors, mediators and moderators of the study. It was found out that communal positive orientation positively predicted relationship and individual subscale of psychological flourishing. Communal negative orientation positively predicted relationship subscale of psychological flourishing among married sample. Emotional expressivity and its subscales significantly mediated the relationship by producing indirect conditional effect on relation between predictor and outcome. Emotional regulation as moderator implies interaction effect between the relationship of predictor and outcome through its cognitive reappraisal subscale. Communal negative orientation negatively predicted individual subscale of psychological flourishing and expressive suppression subscale of emotional regulation was not found to be as moderator between predictor and outcome. Mediated-Moderated analysis and model testing through Hayes’ analysis in Process macro yielded multiple significant interactions that contributed towards theoretical understanding of flourishing of marital relationship. The mediated-moderated effect indicated the presence, in a single model, of one or more mediating variables and one or more moderating variables. This method made it possible rigorously and simultaneously to test both mediating (emotional expressivity) and moderating (emotional regulation) effects. In terms of demographic variables, findings also depicted that husbands are higher as compared to wives in terms of communal negative orientation and emotional expressivity. Whereas, wives manifested higher levels of psychological flourishing and its subscales as compared to husbands. However, no differences were observed in terms of emotion regulation strategies among married individuals. It was also found that individuals of love x marriages are high on communal negative orientation, cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression subscales as compared to individuals of arrange marriages. The study is important as it contributes to the literature of positive psychology with reference to marital relationships belonging to eastern culture. The study has particular implications in development and validation of psychological instruments vital to assess optimal functioning of married population. The study is also fundamental in exploring theoretically significant variables in extending indigenous understanding of psychological flourishing with reference to married population.