Product DescriptionIn Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage, marital psychologists John and Julie Gottman provide vital tools-scientifically based and empirically verified-that you can use to regain affection and romance lost through years of ineffective communication.In 1994, Dr. John Gottman and his colleagues at the University of Washington made a startling announcement: Through scientific observation and mathematical analysis, they could predict-with more than 90 percent accuracy-whether a marriage would succeed or fail. The only thing they did not yet know was how to turn a failing marriage into a successful one, so Gottman teamed up with his clinical psychologist wife, Dr. Julie Schwartz Gottman, to develop intervention methods. Now the Gottmans, together with the Love Lab research facility, have put these ideas into practice.What emerged from the Gottmans’ collaboration and decades of research is a body of advice that’s based on two surprisingly simple truths: Happily married couples behave like good friends, and they handle their conflicts in gentle, positive ways. The authors offer an intimate look at ten couples who have learned to work through potentially destructive problems-extramarital affairs, workaholism, parenthood adjustments, serious illnesses, lack of intimacy-and examine what they’ve done to improve communication and get their marriages back on track.Hundreds of thousands have seen their relationships improve thanks to the Gottmans’ work. Whether you want to make a strong relationship more fulfilling or rescue one that’s headed for disaster, Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage is essential reading.About the AuthorJohn M. Gottman, Ph.D., and Julie Schwartz Gottman, Ph.D., are the founders and directors of the Gottman Institute and the Relationship Research Institute in Seattle.The bestselling author of The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work and The Relationship Cure, among other books, John Gottman is a professor of psychology, an elected fellow of the American Psychological Association, and the recipient of numerous awards and commendations. His research and findings have been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Time, the bestselling book Blink, and in the broadcast media.Julie Schwartz Gottman established the Gottman Institute’s Marriage Clinic and serves as its clinical director. A clinical psychologist, she is in private practice in Seattle, where she and John live.Joan DeClaire is a writer specializing in psychology, health, and family issues.Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.IntroductionFrom Predicting Divorce to Preventing It: An Introductory Message from John and Julie GottmanIt’s been more than a decade since John and his colleagues at the University of Washington (UW) first announced their discovery: Through the power of careful observation and mathematical analysis, the team had learned to predict with more than 90 percent accuracy whether a married couple would stay together or eventually divorce. This discovery captured the imagination of many. If research psychologists could now pinpoint specific behaviors that lead to divorce, then perhaps people in troubled relationships could change those behaviors and save their marriages.But as any weatherman can tell you, the ability to predict trouble is not the same as the ability to prevent it. It’s one thing to detect a storm brewing on radar; it’s quite another to make those storm clouds disappear.And yet that’s the kind of work we at the Gottman Institute have been doing. Since 1994 we’ve been developing tools to help couples identify problems that are proven to destroy relationships-and to turn those problems around. By experimenting with various forms of therapy, we’ve been learning how to help husbands and wives improve their marriages and prevent divorce.Through our workshops, therapy sessions, and books, couples are gaining the tools they need to build stronger friendships and man
