The author of a long-running study into the lives of almost 300 men has spoken about his work at an event hosted by relationship charity OnePlusOne.
George E. Vaillant, Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, followed the lives of 268 men in the Harvard Grant Study.
The 75-year study reports on all aspects of the men’s lives, including their relationships, political and religious views, coping strategies, and lifestyle choices such as alcohol consumption.
It found that the most common factor in divorces involving men taking part in the Grant Study was alcoholism; 34 of the divorces (57%) had occurred when at least one spouse was abusing alcohol.
However, the study points out that divorce is not necessarily always a bad outcome. For many participants it gave them a second and sometimes third or fourth chance of finding happiness with a partner.
Professor George E. Vaillant said: “What the Grant study teaches us about marriage, intimacy and mental health is not that divorce is bad, but that loving people for a long time is good. The most important finding proves that the only thing that really matters in life is your relations to other people.
“Mutual interdependence comes later to some people than others, but most of the Grant men got there, which proves that the best marriages got better with time.”
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