Pathways between attachment and marital satisfaction: The mediating roles of rumination, empathy, and forgiveness

• Attachment theory was used to explore marital satisfaction.
• Anxious/avoidant attachment was linked to marital satisfaction via forgiveness.
• Insecure attachment strategies were related to rumination and lack of empathy.
• Teaching and encouraging forgiveness may improve marital satisfaction.
• Attachment, rumination, empathy, and forgiveness affect martial satisfaction.

This study explored a path to marital satisfaction based on attachment theory. For this purpose, a sample of 208 Korean married teachers completed a survey on adult attachment, rumination, empathy, forgiveness, and marital satisfaction. Through structural equation modeling (SEM), a path in which adult attachment leads to marital satisfaction, mediated by dispositional forgiveness, was found. I also found a distinctive path by which anxious and avoidant attachment negatively affect forgiveness and marital satisfaction through excessive rumination and lack of empathy. These results suggest that the most accurate model of the relation between attachment, rumination, empathy, forgiveness, and marital satisfaction involves analyzing direct, indirect, and gender effects. Marriage counselors and therapists can use these results to gain a deeper understanding of the underpinnings of marital life and, ultimately, help reduce the very high divorce rate in Korea.