The mandatory stay-at-home orders enacted throughout much of the United States during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic required many couples to abruptly restructure their day-to-day lives. How did managing this unexpected stress affect couples' relationship quality? To answer this question we asked 204 participants (age range 18-83) to complete a 14-day daily survey in May 2020 and again in November/December 2020. Approximately half of participants were married and most (88%) had been living with their partner prior to quarantine; however, 12% moved in with their partner due to quarantine. About 20% of our sample had children under the age of 18 living with them and 17% were deemed essential workers. Most of our participants reported living in an urban or suburban area with less than 20% reporting living in a small town or rural area.

A few recent findings: 

• Blaming the pandemic for relationship problems reduced the harmful effects of stress on couples' relationship quality (Blame the Pandemic). Read media coverage here and here
• Some other descriptive findings for fun: It turns out that quarantining did not appear to put a damper on enjoying being with one’s partner. People reported sharing a leisure activity, having a pleasant meal, and laughing with their partner on over 70% of days. That said, it was not all fun and laughter as people also reported that on approximately 21% of days their partner irritated them. Women tended to say that their partner irritated them more often (23% of days) than they irritated their partner (19% of days). Interestingly, men tended to report irritating their partner more often (26% of days) and being irritated by their partner less often (17% of days). It seems men and women agree on who is more irritating! We also asked about the best and worst moments of the day and the answers were many and varied. People reported their partner as being the thing that brought them the most joy in a given day as demonstrated in this answer “The life that I have with my wife and how grateful I am to be going through it with her.” However, partners were also the reason people experienced their highest levels of upset in a day: “Irritated with husband’s bad mood.” Children and family also tended to show up as high points: “Going on a walk with my daughter and chasing her and playing tag with her!” and low points: “Toddler meltdown;” “Getting my child to focus during her online class session.” We also noticed that many of the trends that were receiving media attention during that time showed up in the answers. High points involved baking: “baking project experiment – banana bread with blueberries”; playing video games “caught tarantula in Animal Crossing”; and adopting new pets “New dog!!!”. Unfortunately, less fun trends, like disagreements surrounding the pandemic made appearances in low points: “Argument with partner over his family not social distancing.”