Dissolution of Relationships, Coping and Aftermath

The Consequences of Romantic Separations

This review begins with an important question: Do romantic separations lead to increases in psychological distress? The short answer is yes, but a longer and more detailed analysis suggests that many of the putative consequences of a breakup experience may be causes of the separation itself. Several studies indicate that the psychological problems commonly associated with marital separation (e.g., depression, substance use and abuse, decreases in life satisfaction) predate the divorce and sometimes even the marriage. These findings hold true for nonmarital breakups as well, but the evidence remains mixed, with some research demonstrating that high levels of depression (among those who break up) existed before the separation and other studies showing that depression is a distinct consequence of the end of a relationship. These selection-causation effects may differ depending on the outcomes of interest. Evidence indicates that problems of substance abuse, including diagnosable substance use disorders, increase in the wake of a separation. Perhaps the strongest evidence for the causal effect of romantic separations comes from genetically controlled studies of twins discordant for mood disorders. Given that monozygotic twins have an identical genotype, differences in life events are presumed to be causal agents in the onset of psychopathology when the twins are discordant for a particular psychological profile. In twins discordant for major depression, marital separations yield a raw risk of 21.6 percent for the onset of a major depressive episode in the first month after the event, which suggests a strong causal effect from divorce to a depressive episode. (This finding, unfortunately, says little about subclinical experiences such as loneliness, longing, generalized dysphoria and sadness, and loss of satisfaction with life, which are among the most commonly described consequences of a separation experience.) Overall, there is clear evidence that negative psychological states can both select people out of marriage and emerge as a specific consequence of the separation experience.

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