NETWORK STRUCTURE, NETWORK SUPPORT AND THE MARITAL SATISFACTION OF HUSBANDS AND WIVES

This study investigated the relationships between husbands' and wives' marital satisfaction, wives' labour force participation, and various aspects of the couples' social networks and social support in a sample of 166 families with at least one preschool-aged child. Wives experie nced greater marital satisfaction when more of their own network membe rs were related to each other, when they were friends with their husba nds' network members and when their husbands nominated more relatives in their networks. For women with moderate labour force participation only, marital satisfaction decreased when the couple's network was les s dense. Husbands experienced higher marital satisfaction when their w ives had high or low rather than just moderate participation in the la bour force. However, after adjusting for this, they also had higher ma rital satisfaction when they had more reciprocal relationships with th eir own network members, when more of their network members were relat ed to their wives' network members, and when they considered more of t heir wives' network members to be their own friends. The results provi ded support for Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological model.