Happy marriage cuts stress for women

LONDON: One of the biggest stressors in a woman's life is a bumpy marriage - the worse the marriage, the higher the stress level but "the better the wedding, the lower the stress level".

Yes, according to a study carried out by researchers, a happy marriage cuts stress for working women as they have lower levels of a stress hormone than those in miserable relationships, the Daily Mail reported here on Wednesday.

However, it does not make any difference in case of their husbands as men's stress levels are determined mainly by how busy they are at work, not the state of their home life.

According to lead researcher Darby Saxbe of University of California, "As far as women are concerned, being happily married appears to bolster physiological recovery from work."

"Women in unhappy marriages are coming home from a busy day and, instead of having some time to relax and have a spouse picking up the load of setting the table, getting dinner going, signing forms for the kids, these women may have immediately to launch back into another stressful routine," he said.

"Perhaps in happily married couples the demands of domestic life are being shared more equitably between men and women, or at least that may be the case when wives return home from a demanding day at work," Darby added.

The researchers came to the conclusion after analysing a data of 60 married parents who were asked how satisfied they were with their marriage and how busy they were at work. They also collected saliva samples from participants in the early morning, afternoon and evening to measure cortisol levels.

Women in happy marriages were found to have stronger declines of the hormone than those in less blissful unions while in men, the state of their relationship with their wife appeared to have little influence on levels of cortisol, which were affected far more by how busy they felt at work.