Although couples’ support exchanges are especially important during times of stress, coping with stress often taxes individuals’ energy and resources and may render it more difficult for partners to provide support to one another. In a daily diary study of 121 married couples, we examined whether spouses’ chronic and daily non-marital stressors were associated with their capacity to accurately perceive their partner’s support needs and to provide support when needed. Consistent with the notion that stress may be linked to reduced perspective-taking, husbands experiencing greater chronic stress were less accurate in their assessments of their partner’s support needs across the diary days. Moreover, even when husbands did notice that their partner desired support, they were less likely to provide support if they were coping with their own stress that day. Thus, the findings highlight the multiple pathways through which stress can undermine support provision within relationships.

尽管夫妻之间的支持交流在压力时期尤为重要，但应对压力往往会消耗个人的精力和资源，并可能使合作伙伴更难以相互提供支持。在对 121 对已婚夫妇的每日日记研究中，我们检查了配偶的慢性和日常非婚姻压力源是否与他们准确感知伴侣的支持需求和在需要时提供支持的能力有关。与压力可能与观点采纳减少有关的观点一致，承受更大慢性压力的丈夫在他们对伴侣在日记中的支持需求的评估中不太准确。此外，即使丈夫确实注意到他们的伴侣需要支持，如果他们在应对当天的压力，他们就不太可能提供支持。因此，研究结果强调了压力可以通过多种途径破坏关系中的支持提供。