I don't know how to copy and paste on a phone or else I would. But I came across a study that says couples who yell and show contempt after any argument (a mix of anger and disgust by putting the other person down, calling names, etc) tend to divorce soon or later 93% of the time, so far as even completely disengaging from the other spouse altogether for as long as 16 years. What are your thoughts about this? As a 24 year old male who grew up in a house that did nothing but yell up til I was 15, I still am wary of any potential relationship to this day, even though I would love to meet somebody and grow with her. I don't like conflict and fighting, and I try to stay away from this as much as possible. What do you think both men and women can do differently in the future that can keep studies like these releasing such a high number, and have less psychological, physical, and emotional effect on the parties involved, including the spouses and any kids they have?
Something that helped me early in life was meditating on Jesus' words about being guilty for calling a brother 'Raca' and being in danger of Hell fire for saying 'thou fool.' I can't think of a time my wife and I did name-calling like that. If you grew up in a home where people yelled, you may need to pray about and examine yourself to see if you think you will follow that 'script.'
Knowing what you know, you should be very careful about your selection of wife. One theory is that men marry women like their mothers. If your mother yelled and showed contempt to your father, you may need to carefully think through the personality type you are attracted to, and pray about being attracted to someone else.
You can look for a woman who really embraces Biblical roles for wives, who consciously accepts the idea of a wife submitting to her husband and really sees showing respect to her husband as important. If she hasn't thought about it, you can help teach her that these things are important for a marriage. Intellectually accepting that stuff helps. If a woman can't discuss the issue of submission in marriage, then I'd take that as a serious red flag.
You also want a woman who is not quarrelsome. If your mom argued a bit, you'll just have to keep in the back of your mind that quarrelsome is a bad thing and be conscious of it so your 'instincts' which come from what you were raised with don't overpower your good sense. Yelling is quarrelsome. But some women get pouty or give you the cold shoulder if they don't get their way. Find a woman who has trained herself to forgive easily. It's difficult if you are with someone who gets upset and angry over nothing, and then won't forgive you for doing basically nothing. Stay away from women who are petty. Do they say that out of the South? That means she gets upset over very small things and makes a big deal out of it.
Try to find a woman who is, of course, kind, and accommodating, someone who stays cool under pressure. If 50% of marriages in the US end in divorce, that means the other 50% don't. You need to find someone who is unlikely to divorce you.
There are stats that divorce rates among evangelicals are the same as the world (not statistically significantly different) in the US. I've read that far less than 1% of Christian couples who actually pray together divorce. I don't think that's been in a peer reviewed journal, but I think it was asked at a question at either one or two Christian conferences with a very large sample size, so it's something to consider. I've also read that while people who profess an evangelical faith have the same divorce rates as the world, that frequent church attendance corresponds with lower divorce rates (maybe 30% lower.)
I don't remember the numbers, but Teachman 1990 found that virgins (and women who'd only been with their husbands before marriage) were much less likely to divorce than those who had multiple sexual partners. Marrying certain ethnic groups lowers your chances of divorce as well. I've read that those who marry Filipinas have lower divorce rates. Some cultures highly value marriage. I married an Indonesian and in the local community in the past 6 years, of about 50 families, I don't think there has been a single divorce. I know a couple of them have divorces in their past. Indonesia is mostly Muslim, so divorce isn't considered forbidden by the majority religion. But it does seem rare among Christians. I think I know of three or four couples out of my wife's extended family who had divorce or something similar going on, and that's a big family, much lower than my own extended family in the US. It's not socially acceptable there, though this is less true than in the past. There are also plenty of women who take marriage seriously in western countries if you can find them. The dominant culture promotes divorce and sexual immorality.
