by Eric Payne
As married people, there’s only one thing we do more than breathe while living under the same roof. We talk or otherwise, communicate — for better or worse. From the moment we open our eyes to the time that we close them we are actively engaged in making sure that the people with whom we share our lives and need to interact with understand us. Whether articulate or blunt, sugar coated or acrid, words ““ both the ones we choose to speak and the way we interpret those spoken to us determine the course of our days, everyday. And believe it or not, married folks are at a disadvantage when it comes having a gift for gab.
Many people on the outside looking in are inclined to believe that people who are married communicate better. Many married people are under the impression that they are better communicators because of the closeness they share with their spouses. And when we as married people don’t seem to be getting through to our partners we believe a) something is wrong with them; b) something is wrong with them; or c) something is wrong with the marriage, or some combination of all three. However it turns out that it is this familiarity that comes with marriage that provides the stumbling block for much of our communication.
What We Have Here Is A Failure To Communicate
A recent University of Chicago study found that married couples don’t communicate any better than strangers do because of all the reading between the lines that takes place, and the expectation that our spouses “get us.”
Boaz Keysar, a professor in psychology at the University of Chicago states:
“People commonly believe that they communicate better with close friends than with strangers. That closeness can lead people to overestimate how well they communicate, phenomenon we term the “˜closeness-communication bias.'”
The reality is that men and women, strangers and spouses alike, interpret what is said to them with about the same level of accuracy. The difference arises in that spouses expect to be understood for exactly what they mean, not necessarily what they say. This is when problems arise. Phil Dunphy, a father and husband and central character on the ABC sitcom Modern Family portrays this phenomenon perfectly. At least once and episode, but usually multiple times, he acts on “miscues” from his wife, thinking she is coming on to him, when 9 times out of 10 she isn’t. So there is an illusion of understanding that actually doesn’t exist. In fact we more likely to communicate better to strangers because we go into conversations with people we don’t know, understanding that they don’t know us or what is in our heads. We are less likely to imply and more likely to be direct.
Listen? Yes. Interpret Correctly? Not So Much.
At least once a week my wife is trying to get me to confess to not listening to her. But I hear almost everything she has to say unless I actually can’t hear due to some other noise drowning her out. But understanding what she says as she intends it is something else entirely. Sometimes I miss the boat. I just don’t get it. My male brain is preoccupied or tuned in to another frequency. There are times when I am factoring in too much of my understanding of her to correctly interpret what she says, which she is quick to point out. Then there are times when I am expected to know what she means because I know her, or at least she thought I did. Equally there are moments when I am talking with my wife that I am sure I must be speaking another language. This is all cause for the phrase, “Say what you mean and mean what you say” to take on new and fresh relevance.
What do you think BMWK — should your spouse — husbands and wives alike just know what you mean because of who you all are in each other’s lives? Is it their fault for not understanding you? Or could you both benefit from equally making the effort to speak with clarity in order to avoid the gray areas and the inevitable ensuing arguments?
Eric is the author of Love Notes: Poems & Stories and the now infamous, My Wife Is NOT My Friend (on Facebook). He talks about being a man, dad and husband on his blog, Makes Me Wanna Holler ““ Man, Dad, Husband and his Facebook Page. He is the author of I See Through Eyes, a book of poetry and short stories. In his “spare time” Eric reviews autos, tech products and writes relationship articles for Atlanta-based J’Adore Magazine.