
Researchers don't only ask couples whether they're happy.
Some studies examine how partners tell the story of their relationship.
The amount of affection, negativity, disappointment, togetherness, and even chaos appearing in those stories can provide information about the relationship.
Partners can describe the same history while giving it completely different emotional meanings.
This is interesting because memories aren't merely lists of events—they reveal how people currently understand those events.
Sometimes how someone tells their love story says as much as what happened in it.
©Journal of Family Psychology