Establishing the feasibility of computerized intervention in retraining maladaptive relationship attributions in married women

Abstract

Marital distress is highly associated with specific maladaptive attributional styles. Thus, to the extent that relationship attributional style can be modified by a computerized attribution retraining program, the program may be helpful as an adjunct to couples therapy. Furthermore, there are benefits associated with computerized assessment, and there are currently no computerized measures assessing attributional style. Computerized tests of attributions and an attribution retraining program targeting marital attributions was administered to 30 married women. The computerized attribution retraining was effective in increasing participants’ benign attributions for negative partner behavior. The computerized assessment proved to have good reliability as well as convergent and discriminate validity. These results suggest that marital attributions are malleable via brief, minimal-contact methodologies, encouraging further exploration of this technology.