Abstract:
Marital satisfaction, a disposition associated with perceived benefits, is used to evaluate the
marital relationships to improve their marital quality. Reports have linked childhood trauma
with low levels of marital satisfaction in women. Previous studies on marital satisfaction
focused more on family and environmental factors than on interventions, such as, Cognitive
Processing Therapy (CPT) and Stress Inoculation Therapy (SIT). This study, therefore, was
designed to investigate the effects of CPT and SIT on marital satisfaction of women with
childhood trauma in Ibadan, Nigeria. The moderating effects of personality types and spousal
support were also examined.
The Vulnerability Stress Adaptation Model of Marriage and Theory of Personality
Development served as the framework. The mixed methods of sequential explanatory design
(QUAN qual) consisting of the pretest-posttest control group quasi-experimental with a
3x2x3 factorial matrix were adopted. Three out of 11 Local Government Areas (LGAs), with
a large concentration of women attending Primary Healthcare Centres (PHCs) for prenatal
and postnatal, were purposively selected. The women in the three PHCs were screened using
the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-short form (r=0.93) and those who scored 50.0% and
above were selected. The intact centres were exposed to CPT (40), SIT (41) and the control
(35) groups for eight weeks. The instruments used were Myers-Briggs Type Indicator-Short
Version (r=0.97); Enrich Marital Satisfaction (r=0.77) and Spousal Support (r=0.96) scales.
Three sessions of focus group discussion were held with married women. The quantitative
data were analysed using analysis of covariance, estimated marginal means and Sidak paircomparison test at 0.05 level of significance, while the qualitative data were contentanalysed.
The participants‟ age was 29.70±6.06 years, and spousal support ( =3.87) was high against
the threshold of 2.50. There was a significant main effect of treatment on marital satisfaction
of women with childhood trauma (F(2;97)=27.98; partial 2=0.37). The married women
exposed to SIT had the highest marital satisfaction ( = 50.02), against those in CPT ( =
49.78) and control ( = 37.06) groups. There was a significant main effect of spousal support
on marital satisfaction of women with childhood trauma (F(2;97)=11.51, partial 2=0.19). The
participants with moderate level of spousal support ( = 50.69) benefitted more than those in
the high ( = 45.53) and low ( = 40.64) levels. There was no main effect of personality types.
There was a significant interaction effect of treatment and personality types on marital
satisfaction of women with childhood trauma (F(2;97)=3.10; partial 2=0.06), in favour of
introverted women from SIT group. The two-way interaction effects of treatment and spousal
support; personality types as well as spousal support were not significant. The three-way
interaction effect was not significant. High expectations constituted problems in marriage,
while understanding each other‟s differences can improve marital satisfaction.
Cognitive processing and stress inoculation therapies enhanced marital satisfaction of women
with childhood trauma in Ibadan, Nigeria. These two therapies should be adopted by
marriage and family health practitioners, and other bodies involved with women affairs to
improve marital satisfaction among women with childhood trauma.
