The Worst four amongst, certain Styles

The four horsemen: recognizing problems before they arise John Gottman, Professor of Psychology at Washington Univeristy, has been studying married couples for 25 years and has come up with a lot of interesting, highly accurate ways of evaluating the health of a relationship. In fact, using a 3 minute video of a couple interacting with each other, he can predict the success or failure of a marriage with over 90% accuracy. What he has found is that there are certain styles of interacting that tend to be harbingers of doom for a relationships. The worst four amongst these he calls ‘the four horsemen’, since they tend to be apocalyptic in their destructiveness. The four are criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling. If you engage in these communication styles on occasion, that’s okay everybody does them to some extent.

The problem arises when they become the principal mode of communication. The worst of these four is contempt and it’s actually the most easily avoided of the four. There’s really no place for it in a loving relationship. So keep your eyes open for unannounced guest appearances of the four horsemen in your relationship, both in yourself and your partner.