BASMT Conference on Intimacy in the l990s, Leeds, UK, November 1997: Gender and intimacy in the treatment of couples in the 1990s

This article describes the problems of relating gender issues to marital treatment, the need to do so and a model for constructively introducing gender issues into treatment. The article attempts to show why gender is an issue that can not be ignored in treating couples in the 1990s. It reviews research which shows that women are less happy than men and feel marriage is unfair to them. Changing norms over a period of social change have left men and women alike ambivalent and confused about gender roles. These underlying ambivalences interact with normal marital dynamics to create a unique situation today. Currently marital distress is the norm for most couples. The therapist who is aware of the impact of social change on the couple needs a method for dealing with distress that takes this normative aspect into account. A model based on fairness, and not equality, is proposed as a way to bridge the gender gap in dealing with social change and to create a context for beginning to relate to gender issues that arise in therapy in a positive manner. Case descriptions are presented to highlight some of the issues related to fairness, gender and changing sex roles of marital partners.