Increasingly, professionals are recognizing the need to help couples who are

transitioning to parenthood establish more constructive approaches to regulating and

resolving conflict (e.g., Glade, Bean, & Vira, 2005; Shapiro & Gottman, 2005). While

earlier studies tended to define constructive conflict narrowly (Crohan, 1996; Kluwer et

al., 1997), more recent research is broadening the definition (Heinicke & Guthrie, 1996;

Paley et al., 2005). The results of the present study add to this emerging principle.

Examining Gottman's couple conflict types as they presented in first-time parents

resulted in findings suggesting there are appreciably different ways couples can

constructively approach conflict. As noted previously, the hostile couple conflict type

score was repeatedly associated with negative outcomes (including higher marital

disaffection and role dissatisfaction). However none of Gottman's three regulated types

was found to be a significant predictor of role dissatisfaction. Higher volatile couple

conflict type scores explained some of the variance in husbands' violated expectations,

but was also found to be a significant predictor of less marital disaffection. The validating

couple conflict type score was not a significant predictor in any of the stepwise regression

analyses, but was associated with less marital disaffection and role dissatisfaction, and

more individual well-being in the canonical correlation procedure. It was also related to

less child-related task differentiation in the Pearson correlational matrix. The conflict-

avoiding type score was not significantly related, positively or negatively, to any of the

study's variables except the other couple conflict types. This overall lack of predictive

quality compared to the hostile type score suggests the three regulated couple conflict

types are more like each other than they are like the hostile couple conflict type which

was associated with negative outcomes.