The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

328 Chapter 9

and demand (Gottman & Carrere, 1994). This

demand/withdraw pattern has been present in

marriage since the early part of the 20th cen-

tury (Gottman & Carrere, 1994).

Numerous studies of married couples

have been conducted that rely on couples’ self-

reports of demand and withdraw behavior as

well as on coders’ observations of such be-

havior while couples discuss problems. There

is a great deal of agreement between the two

measures of demand and withdraw behav-

ior. Apparently couples know who demands

and who withdraws. Across these studies,

Christensen and Heavey conclude that about

60% of couples are characterized by wife

demand/husband withdraw, 30% by hus-

band demand/wife withdraw, and 10% by

an equal proportion of both demanding and

withdrawing.

Explanations. Why do wives tend to be

the demanders and husbands tend to be the

withdrawers? There are three explanations.

Christensen and Heavey (1993) suggest that

wives and husbands have a fundamental con-

flict: Women prefer closeness and men prefer

independence. This is the basic dilemma iden-

tified by Rubin (1983) and Chodorow (1978).

Men can achieve independence on their own,

but women require the support of their part-

ner to achieve closeness. This fundamental

conflict leads women and men to employ

different strategies in relationships. Women

need to demand to obtain closeness, whereas

men can withdraw to achieve independence.

Christensen and Heavey measured con-

flict over closeness versus independence and

found this type of conflict is associated with

greater demand/withdraw behavior. In ad-

dition, the person who wanted greater close-

ness (usually the woman) was more likely to

be the demander, and the person who wanted

greater independence (usually the man) was

more likely to be the withdrawer.

lesbian, gay, and heterosexual couples were

videotaped discussing a problem (Gottman,

Levenson, Swanson, et al., 2003). Homosex-

ual couples were less belligerent, less domi-

nant, and more likely to maintain a positive

tone throughout the interaction compared to

their heterosexual counterparts. Homosexual

couples also used more affection and humor

throughout the interaction compared to het-

erosexual couples.

Demand/Withdraw Pattern

Here’s another interaction between a wife

and a husband. Read this and decide what is

going on here.

Person A : Why don’t you spend a little

more time working inside the house?

Person B : What? What do you mean?

Person A : You are never at home and

when you are at home, you don’t even clean up

after yourself. I have to clean up everything.

(silence)

Person A : You could at least read Mandy a

bedtime story.

(still no response; in fact, the sound of a

newspaper opening up can be heard)

Links to Gender. Woman or man? Who

do you believe is more likely to be Person A?

Person B? This episode is an example of the

demand/withdraw pattern(Christensen &

Heavey, 1993). It is characterized by one per-

son demanding, if not nagging, and the other

person not responding, or withdrawing. The

demander is more likely to initiate problem dis-

cussion, whereas the withdrawer is more likely

to avoid problem discussion. Among distressed

and nondistressed couples, the demander is

more likely to be a woman and the withdrawer

to be a man (Christensen & Heavey, 1993;

Gottman, 1994). In public, women are more

likely to appear deferential and polite, but in the

private sphere of marriage, women confront

M09_HELG0185_04_SE_C09.indd 328 6/21/11 12:40 PM