Positive Meta-Cognitions and Meta-Emotions Facilitate Marital Adjustment

The positive metacognitions and meta-emotions measured by PMCEQ measures adaptive metacognitive beliefs people hold about their own cognitive and emotional processes. The study aimed to examine the independent and interaction effects of 'gender' (men & women) and 'levels (low & high) of facets of positive metacognitions and meta-emotions' on marital consensus, affectional expression, marital cohesion, marital satisfaction and overall marital adjustment. For this purpose, 318 spouses (159 husbands & 159 wives) were purposively sampled and were individually administered PMCEQ-H (the Hindi version of Positive Metacognitions & Meta-emotions Questionnaire; PMCEQ) and Marital Adjustment Scale (MAS). The participants falling below M 1SD and above M + 1SD on PMCEQ-H1, PMCEQ-H2 and PMCEQ-H3 factors of PMCEQ-H (respectively referred to as low & high scorers), besides the 'gender' (men & women) variables, were screened out. The 2 x 2 ANOVA (2 gender x 2 levels of facets of PMCEQ-H) performed on the scores of the facets of marital adjustment revealed non-significant main effect of'gender' and interaction effect of 'gender X levels of facets of PMCEQ-H' on all measures of marital adjustment, and significant main effect of (i)levels of PMCEQ-H' on marital satisfaction, affectional expression and overall marital adjustment, (ii) 'levels of PMCEQ-H2' on marital cohesion, marital satisfaction, and overall marital adjustment, and (iii)levels of PMCEQ-H3' for marital consensus and overall marital adjustment; and high as compared to the low scorers on PMCEQ-H1, PMCEQ-H2, and PMCEQ-H3 manifested significantly higher indices on overall adjustment. The findings demonstrated that high level of positive metacognitions and meta-emotions manifest significantly better marital adjustment in married couples.