THE MARITAL ADAPTABILITY AND COHESION EVALUATION SCALE .3. IS THE RELATION WITH MARITAL ADJUSTMENT LINEAR OR CURVILINEAR

A central postulate of the circumplex model is that moderate amounts o f cohesion and adaptability are optimal for couple and family function ing; extremes are hypothesized to be detrimental. Previous family rese arch, however, indicates that cohesion and adaptability are linearly, not curvilinearly, related to family functioning. The authors hypothes ized that, among couples living in Canada (Study 1) and expatriate cou ples living in Nepal (Study 2), there would be linear relations betwee n marital adjustment and both adaptability and cohesion. Participants (Study 1 N = 209; Study 2 N = 187) completed the Marital Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scale III and the Dyadic Adjustment Scale. Pol ynomial trend analyses confirmed that adaptability and cohesion were l inearly related to marital adjustment in both samples; in contrast, an alyses that were based on marital satisfaction data from Study 1 were supportive of the curvilinear hypothesis.