Marriage and health
Health behaviors

Health behaviors such as diet, exercise and substance use, may also affect the interplay of marital quality and health. The health behaviors of married couples converge over time, such that couples who have been married many years have similar behavior. One explanation is that spouses influence or control one another's health behaviors. A spouse's positive control techniques, such as modeling a healthy behavior, increase their partner's intentions to improve health behaviors, whereas negative control techniques, such as inducing fear, do not affect intentions. Marital support may increase the psychological resources—such as self-efficacy, and self-regulation—needed to improve one's health behaviors.
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