Marriage checkup in integrated primary care: A randomized controlled trial with active-duty military couples.

OBJECTIVE: This study assessed the efficacy of the marriage checkup, as adapted to integrated primary care settings and active-duty military couples, for improving relationship health and depressive symptoms. METHOD: Married couples (N = 244, Mage = 32.4, 67.6% Caucasian) in which at least one member was active-duty Air Force were recruited from bases across the U.S. via online advertisement, emails sent from medical clinics to enrolled beneficiaries, social media posts, and flyers, and randomly assigned to active treatment or waitlist control. Treatment and control couples were linked in pairs sequentially and pairs completed nine sets of questionnaires at baseline, 1-, and 6-month posttreatment. Outcome measures included the Couples Satisfaction Index, Intimate Safety Questionnaire, Responsive Attention Scale, Partner Compassion Scale, Communication Skills Test, and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. RESULTS: A three-level multilevel model indicated, after adjustment for multiple comparisons, treatment couples experienced statistically significant small-to-moderate improvements compared to the control group (Cohen's d from 0.21 to 0.55) at 1 month that were sustained at 6 months for relationship satisfaction, responsive attention, compassion toward their partners, communication skills, intimate safety, and depressive symptoms. CONCLUSIONS: A longitudinal randomized control trial of the MC supports the hypothesis that the MC significantly improves relationship satisfaction, intimacy, communication, partner compassion, responsive attention, and depressive symptoms. Implications for theory, treatment, and dissemination are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Reproductive success and mate choice in Long-Evans rats.

In the present study, mating behavior was observed in female rats that were given the opportunity to mate with two male rats simultaneously. Eleven sexually naïve, naturally cycling rats were assigned to one pair of sexually experienced cohabitating male rats. Each female rat was mated during proestrous with her assigned pair of males. Eight females successfully became pregnant and gave birth to healthy pups (approximately 9 pups/litter). After the offspring were weaned, paternity of each pup was determined using microsatellite DNA markers. Based on this analysis, it was determined that one male in each pair sired the majority of the pups in the litter. No male sexual behaviors or characteristics distinguished male rats that sired the majority of pups from those that sired few or none of the pups. Furthermore, neither female mate preference nor measures of paced mating behavior differed between male rats that had a reproductive advantage from those that did not. Finally, ejaculation order also failed to predict reproductive success of the male rats. Together, these results suggest that reproductive success of some male rats may not depend on specific mating behaviors, but rather their success may depend on physiological or genetic traits that make them unique.

"Some guys have all the luck": mate preference influences paced-mating behavior in female rats.

In the present study, mating behavior was observed in female rats that were given the opportunity to mate with two males simultaneously. Three groups of females were tested: 1) sexually naïve, naturally cycling rats in proestrous; 2) sexually naïve, hormone-primed, ovariectomized (OVX) rats; and 3) hormone-primed, OVX rats tested 1 week after sexual receptivity testing. One male rat was determined to be the preferred male for each female, if she spent more time with him during a mating test. Independent of sexual experience, female rats were less likely to leave their preferred male than their non-preferred male following intromissions. However, when they left their preferred male, they returned to him faster than to their non-preferred male. This effect of preference was slightly more robust in the OVX rats. When female rats from Group 2 were tested with the same pair of males for 3 additional tests, each female's preference for a particular male was stable. That is, a female rat preferred the same male in approximately 3 out of the 4 tests, which is more likely than would be expected by chance. In a final experiment, pairs of male rats were tested with different females once weekly to determine if different females would prefer particular males consistently. Although no male rat was preferred by all females, females consistently preferred the same male from each pair during approximately 70% of the tests. In conclusion, female mate preference may have adaptive significance for the reproductive success of rats.