Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

by Charles Duhigg

These early studies revealed interesting patterns: Many couples were quite good at listening to each other and even proving they were listening. “That’s kind of the minimum for a marriage,” said Stanley. “If you can’t show the other person you’re listening, you probably won’t get married in the first place.” Couples might not have been looping each other, but, either through intuition or advice they had received, they had figured out how to show they wanted to understand one another. And yet, despite all that listening, America’s divorce rate was skyrocketing: In 1979, more than a million couples—triple the number from just a decade earlier—had chosen to end their marriages. The scientists wondered: If couples were so good at hearing each other and proving they heard one another, why were they still splitting up? The researchers started digging into their data. Eventually, two findings emerged. First, unsurprisingly, they confirmed that nearly every couple fought. Some couples argued frequently—about 8 percent of married Americans fight at least once a day—while others bickered only occasionally. But regardless of frequency, nearly every marriage contained some degree of conflict. The second discovery was that, for some couples, those conflicts and arguments didn’t seem to have much lasting impact. Regardless of how frequently some people battled, they said they were still fulfilled by their marriages, happy with their choice of spouse, and reported no thoughts of divorce ...