Enright's Forgiveness Therapy in Young Married Couples After Infidelity

Introduction

Forgiveness is a hard thing to achieve in full honesty. Yet it is an important step in moving past an act of infidelity or other injury. The following proposal explores previous research on Enright's forgiveness process model and how it is applied to various population groups who have had to deal with emotional injuries. It then moves on to explore the need to study Enright's model within young married couples who have had to deal with a recent infidelity within the context of their marriage. It outlines specific stages that counselors will assess based on a sliding scale in order to generate statistical data for analysis.

The topic of infidelity is a very sensitive one within the context of all marriages. It represents the violation of one of the most sacred marital principles. What does a couple do when faced with such a disastrous situation? Many couples will opt to take the easy road out and completely end the marriage. However, there are those who still love one another so deeply that they will be willing to do whatever it takes to reconcile their marriage and continue with their lives. The question is: how do couples forgive?

There are various methods by which a counselor can help a couple achieve a healthy balance within a marriage after one or both parties have been unfaithful. Forgiveness itself is important within the scope of counseling, for it "is a response to unfairness that includes the diminution of resentment or anger toward an offender and the institution of more positive feelings, thoughts, and behaviors toward that person" (Knutson et al., 2008, p. 194). The role of counseling following an infidelity is immensely important. It can help facilitate true forgiveness by the injured party in a healthy way through various steps. In fact, "the process of forgiveness in romantic relationships enables victims to view themselves as accommodating, their partners as redeemable, and their relationships as resilient" (Gunderson & Ferrari, 2008, p. 3). It gives the relationship new hope to fight through such difficulties and move forward with the life the couple had previously planned. Forgiveness is an essential part of either closing the relationship or moving forward with it: "Forgiveness is critical in determining whether couples repair their relationships and restore closeness following hurtful events" (Bachman & Guerrero, 2006, p. 46).

However, forgiveness is not something easily achieved. True forgiveness takes time and effort on the part of both the injurer and the injured. It is a journey that must be consciously decided upon in order to genuinely rectify the infidelity that caused such chaos within the relationship.

There are several approaches by which a counselor can facilitate this real type of forgiveness and allow a couple to move past the actual act of infidelity. One of these methods has been formulated and studied by researcher Robert Enright, who composed a process model to guide couples through such trying times. Within this process model, Enright isolated twenty-one specific stages of forgiveness within a broader framework of four major phases. These four broad phases provide a pathway through which the injured party is allowed to explore and accept the injury that occurred through their partner's infidelity.

After the initial uncovering of an infidelity, there must be recognition of such an act. Thus, the first stage of Enright's model is the uncovering phase, where the "individual becomes aware of the emotional pain that has resulted from a deep, unjust injury" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). This time period may vary depending on the nature of the infidelity and the mindset of the individual who was injured. Within this phase, the injured party is allowed to explore his or her feelings of anger and hurt as a way to fully understand them and eventually move past them in subsequent stages. "The injury is honestly understood" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). All emotions toward the act of infidelity and toward the party who committed the offense are uncovered and examined. This is an absolutely crucial step in Enright's forgiveness model. Without uncovering such feelings of anger and hurt, there is no true way for the injured party to efficiently move past them. Exploring these emotions may be incredibly painful, but it is an absolute necessity so that the person does not harbor residual feelings of anger or resentment during the latter stages of the model.

The next phase incorporates the conscious decision to move on with the relationship and forgive the injurer for what he or she has done. During this phase, the "individual begins to understand that a change must occur to go ahead with the healing process" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). The injured party must make the painful but honest decision to move forward with the forgiving process in order to rid him or herself of the anger and resentment harbored toward the injurer. Forgiveness is then used as a healing strategy for the injured party. With the conscious decision to forgive comes a sense of power and commitment to the relationship. The injured party commits to forgiving the injurer—not as a total and complete forgiveness right away, but rather as a commitment to the process of forgiveness. True forgiveness is never achieved immediately, and any attempts to claim otherwise will eventually lead to underlying resentment that was never fully explored and expelled from the relationship.

After making the conscious decision to work toward forgiveness, the real work begins. Within this phase, the "individual begins the active work of forgiving the injurer" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). The injured party must act on his or her commitment to fully forgive the one who wronged them—in this case, their romantic partner who committed the infidelity and placed the relationship in danger. The injured party then works to understand the injurer as part of the broader human community, recognizing the pain and suffering the injurer is experiencing in response to having committed the infidelity. After this recognition, the injured party can work to forgive the injurer, which "may or may not include a reconciliation" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). At this stage, the most important thing is that the injured party begins to understand the injurer in a way that goes far beyond the context of the injury itself.

The final broad stage is the actual outcome of the therapy—the deepening phase. In this period, "the emotional relief and newfound meaning may lead to increased compassion for self and others" (Enright & Reed, 2009, p. 1). The injured individual is allowed to find solace in their place within the human community, which then supersedes their own individual drama, including the infidelity that placed them in such turmoil. This is the stage where the injured party may or may not decide on reconciliation, but at this point that decision is not of paramount importance. What is important is that the injured party can feel empathy for the injurer and move forward in a meaningful way. This is the point at which counseling may cease, for the injured party has come to terms with the pain of the infidelity.

Literature Review

Enright's process model of forgiveness has been tested in numerous varying contexts, which lend credibility to its success as a therapeutic tool. It has been used across a broad range of applications that go far beyond marital infidelity. In fact, most academic research utilizing the principles of the forgiveness process model has focused on types of injuries other than marital infidelities.

One of the most difficult populations to work with is that of young children. Unfortunately, children are innocent victims of a wide range of abuses that can cause them to harbor intense feelings of resentment and anger toward their injurers. This negative emotional response to injury can lead to serious behavioral consequences later in life, which can then cause distress in their adult relationships. Thus, the forgiveness process model has been used in therapy with young children in order to test its effectiveness in helping such children forgive their injurers and improve their quality of life, both as children and later as adults. A study conducted by Gambaro in 2002 was designed "to effect emotional regulation with children" (Knutson et al., 2008, p. 195). Enright's model of forgiveness was found to be incredibly successful in helping children forgive their injurers and move past the harmful injury that could otherwise have caused lasting resentment affecting their adult lives.

However, children are not the only population to have been studied within the context of Enright's forgiveness process model. One important empirical study using Enright's model was Waltman's 2002 research, which focused primarily on older adults of middle age or older. The goal was to facilitate genuine forgiveness within adults who were nearing the end of their lives, as a way to improve the quality of that remaining existence. This study incorporated forgiveness for a number of assaults that had caused injured parties to harbor resentment affecting their daily lives. The forgiveness process model was successfully used to help participants make peace with their injurers, who may or may not have been part of the therapeutic process. Waltman's study showed favorable results, with older adults becoming greater contributors to the human community and developing more empathy toward others within that larger communal body.

Another major study did focus on married couples dealing with infidelity. A 2003 study conducted by Knutson examined married couples who had experienced an act of infidelity that had proved damaging to the marital relationship. This is very similar to the context of the current research, but was quite limited in its design. Although the study found favorable results within the practice of the forgiveness model as a therapeutic tool, the researchers admitted that their sample size was incredibly limited, which may have negative implications for the applicability of its findings. The sample population was largely limited to older couples of European descent, thus excluding a large percentage of married couples who have also experienced the pain and harmful effects of infidelity. The small sample size led researchers to believe that a larger and more diverse sample population would have produced stronger results with a greater impact on therapeutic practice.

With these studies in mind, it is clear that more research is needed involving a younger and more diverse population of married couples. Research has shown that "these studies offer a starting point for future work to examine forgiveness and rumination variables in a fashion that allows for clear conclusions about their causal ordering and their unique contributions to mental health" (Worthington, 2005, p. 358). It is therefore the aim of this research to produce meaningful results using a younger and more ethnically diverse population, which can then serve as a model for broader therapeutic application across all types of couples. According to the literature, "as yet, treatment-outcome studies on the use of forgiveness in couple's therapy are still scarce, although the concept of forgiveness is quite prominent in the clinical and theoretical literature" (Worthington, 2005, p. 409).

The population of this research will therefore consist of young adults of all races and ethnicities. Couples from ages 18–34 will form the sample body. It is also imperative that this sample include a variety of ethnicities and races in order to provide findings that extend beyond cultural boundaries. This population typically includes both students and working professionals who, other than being married, are largely unattached. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 58% of the population aged 18–34 were married by the year 2000 (Farley & Haaga, 2000). However, fewer than half of that population had children. The relative absence of children within this age group allows researchers an interesting glimpse into a relationship with fewer external attachments and therefore fewer external reasons for a couple to stay together after an act of infidelity. With no children present, a couple has that much less external pressure to work through an infidelity. Thus, this age group has fewer external incentives to forgive, leaving the option for true forgiveness as a purer decision of the individuals involved.

Additionally, this population holds a markedly different view of what constitutes an adulterous act compared to previous generations. Studies with older populations have focused purely on sexual acts outside the marriage. However, in today's technological world, infidelity can extend well beyond sexual intercourse with a party outside the marital relationship. Modern therapeutic research shows that "the crucial point that two people in a relationship may have different ideas about what constitutes an affair reminds the therapist that this is thorny territory" (Siebler, 2007, p. 117). According to consumer surveys, 82% of 18- to 34-year-olds are "comfortable with technology" (Moskalyuk, 2004, p. 1). This means that nearly 82% of the intended population are capable of communicating with people outside their marriages via channels far beyond telephone calls. With so many new technological ways to interact with others, there are correspondingly new ways of understanding what adultery is. Infidelity can now encompass many behaviors and practices beyond sexual intercourse with an outside party: "Computer sex, telephone sex, and email flirtations are all included within the ambit of adulterous relationships that violate the marital relationship" (Cossman, 2006, p. 274). For the purpose of this study, therefore, infidelity must be understood as extending well beyond actual sexual intercourse.