| Sumario: | A study was conducted to examine how dimensions of hostility and warmth in marital interaction, both as perceived by spouses and as reported by outside observers, influence marital instability. Results demonstrated that greater instability was associated with more hostility and less warmth in marital interactions. Spousal hostility, net of warmth, predicted with 80 percent accuracy which couples would divorce or not divorce within a year and with 88 percent accuracy which couples would be in the two most extreme marital groups—most stable and least stable. Observer reports of behavioral interactions were associated with marital instability both directly and indirectly through partners' perceptions of one another's behaviors.
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