Dyadic coping strategies of Turkish couples and dyadic adjustment during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Background and objectives: External stressful experiences are often linked to poor relationship functioning. Current research examined the association between COVID-19 stress and dyadic adjustment (DA) and tested whether the strength of this association was dependent on specific forms of dyadic coping (DC). Under COVID-19 stress, stress communication and supportive and common DC were expected to be related to higher levels of DA.

Methods: Cross-sectional data were collected from 102 married couples in Turkey. The mean age of men and women was 34.77 years (SD = 8.71) and 32.37 years (SD = 8.06), respectively. Data were analyzed using Actor-Partner Interdependence Moderation Models (APIMoM) with multilevel modeling.

Results: The findings indicated that COVID-19 stress tended to decrease DA. Partners' increased use of emotion-focused supportive DC and effective stress communication buffered the detrimental effect of COVID-19 stress on DA.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that couple interventions in Turkey focusing on the enhancement of emotional expression, stress communication, and validation of the partner may help mitigate the adverse impacts of acute crises on relational well-being.