ArticleBrain, behavior, & immunity - health2021
The health consequences of stress in couples: A review and new integrated Dyadic Biobehavioral Stress Model.
Article in Brain, behavior, & immunity - health, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 23 papers.
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Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed.
- How spousal, friend, and family ties predict health: Within- and between-person effects across 16 years.Journal of family psychology : JFP : journal of the Division of Family Psychology of the American Psychological Association (Division 43) · 2026Article
- Past hurts, present hurdles: Analyzing the impact of adult socioeconomic status and healthcare access on cancer screening among childhood abuse survivors.PLOS global public health · 2026Article
- Relationship stress and epigenetic age acceleration among older U.S. adults in the Midlife in the United States study.Epigenomics · 2025Article
- When Migraine Meets People: A Qualitative Study on the Negative and Positive Influences of Episodic Migraine on Interpersonal Relationships.International journal of behavioral medicine · 2025Article
- The impact of social media addiction on self-esteem and life satisfaction among married couples.Journal of family medicine and primary care · 2025Article
- Longitudinal associations of spousal support and strain with health and well-being: An outcome-wide study of married older U.S. Adults.Family process · 2025Article
- Couples in breast cancer survivorship: Daily associations in relationship satisfaction, stress, and health.Comprehensive psychoneuroendocrinology · 2024Article
- Moving toward affective immunology: Legacy and future directions.Comprehensive psychoneuroendocrinology · 2024Article
- "I too have a responsibility for my partner's life": Communal coping among Malawian couples living with HIV and cardiometabolic disorders.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2024Article
- Couples and concealable chronic illness: Investigating couples' communication, coping, and relational well-being over time.Journal of family psychology : JFP : journal of the Division of Family Psychology of the American Psychological Association (Division 43) · 2024Article
- Article
- Longitudinal associations between cognitive functioning and depressive symptoms among couples in the Mexican Health and Aging Study.International psychogeriatrics · 2023Article
- Marital negativity's festering wounds: The emotional, immunological, and relational toll of couples' negative communication patterns.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2023Article
- How aging couples' emotional and physiological associations change across positive, supportive, and conflictual discussions: Roles of capitalization and responsive behaviors.Biological psychology · 2023Article
- Dynamic associations between stress and relationship functioning in the wake of COVID-19: Longitudinal data from the German family panel (pairfam).Journal of social and personal relationships · 2022Article
- Physical Intimacy in Older Couples' Everyday Lives: Its Frequency and Links With Affect and Salivary Cortisol.The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences · 2022Article
- Intimate Relationships and Coronary Heart Disease: Implications for Risk, Prevention, and Patient Management.Current cardiology reports · 2022Review
- Editorial commentary on the special issue emerging psychoneuroimmunology research: Future leaders in focus.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2022Article
- The gut connection: Intestinal permeability as a pathway from breast cancer survivors' relationship satisfaction to inflammation across treatment.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2022Article
- More often than not, we're in sync: patient and caregiver well-being over time in stem cell transplantation.Health and quality of life outcomes · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
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Abstract
Despite marriage's health benefits, all couples experience stress that can increase morbidity and mortality risks. Marital stress can alter endocrine, cardiovascular, and immune function-key pathways from troubled relationships to poor health. This review discusses how partners "get under each other's skin" to influence psychological, behavioral, and biological health. Then, I offer a comprehensive Dyadic Biobehavioral Stress Model to build on this foundational work and inspire transdisciplinary research integrating psychoneuroimmunological and relational lenses. This conceptual and empirically driven model provides promising new directions to investigate mechanisms linking individuals' relationships behaviors to their own and their partners' health, with particular emphasis on biological pathways. These mechanisms may impact each partner's physical health outcomes, such as disease development, illness severity, and accelerated biological aging. Risk and protective factors across developmental stages and diverse contexts are also discussed to help explain how, and under what conditions, partners influence each other's health. Research applying this model can push the boundaries of our current understanding on dyadic stress its far-reaching health effects on self-report and biological markers across the lifespan.
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