Wedded Bliss Boosts Women's Health

Females in unhappy marriages recover more slowly from stress than men do, research shows. A study underscores that a solid relationship may be good for your health.

Researchers at the University of California's Los Angeles and Davis campuses have found that women in happy marriages recover more quickly from workday stress than women in unhappy ones.

The study, part of an examination of a week in the lives of Los Angeles-area families, may help explain how health benefits of a good marriage play out differently for men and women. "Maybe in addition in promising to go on that diet, you could also promise to sit down with your spouse and talk to them," said Rena Repetti, a psychology professor at UCLA.

Davis professor Adrienne Nishina and Repetti, along with University of California Los Angeles doctoral student Darby Saxbe, wrote the study on stress and married life. They found that the stress hormone cortisol, which normally rises and falls throughout the day, followed different patterns depending on gender and the state of the marriages.

Men, whether in happy or unhappy marriages, tended to rebound quickly from a stressful workday, their cortisol levels showed. So did women in happy marriages. But women in less happy marriages rebounded more slowly, indicating that it took them longer to shed workday stress.