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Moderating Role of Marital Quality in Older Adults' Depressed Affect: Beyond the Main-Effects Model

¹ Department of Psychology, Lafayette College, Easton, Pennsylvania.
² Karmanos Cancer Institute and Department of Family Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan.

We examine the role of three indicators of marital quality (marital disagreement, marital happiness, and time spent together) as moderators of the association between physical disability and depressed affect among married older individuals (N = 1,044). We found support for the moderating role of marital disagreement wherein the detrimental effect of disability on depressed affect was significantly heightened among older adults with more disagreements with their spouse; a moderating effect was not detected for marital happiness or time spent together. We conclude that, in addition to its main effect on older adults' depressed affect, marital quality (as indicated by marital disagreement) plays a significant stress-moderating role in the physical disability–depressed affect link.