Psychological Study of American-Japanese International Divorce

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26301034
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Partial Multi-year Fund
• Section: 海外学術
• Research Field: Educational psychology
• Research Institution: Tokyo City University
• Principal Investigator: Yabuki Rie 東京都市大学, メディア情報学部, 准教授 (30453947)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 国際結婚 / 日米夫婦 / 夫婦間葛藤 / 国際離婚

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In contrast to the decreasing number of married couples, one out of 29 married couples in Japan is international. One out of 14 International marriage couples divorced in 2016 in Japan. However, international marriage and divorce outside Japan, in　which one of the spouses are Japanese, have not been academically researched. The purpose of this research is to obtain family and life-span developmental psychological factors that explain how US-Japan international marriage couples end up being divorced.
20 Japanese wives considering or already divorced from American husbands were subjected to two to three ethnographical interviews about serious marital conflicts that lead them to divorce. The interim results show that social and psychological factors inducing divorce are the same as those for Japanese domestic married couples. Factors which are unique to international marriage couples are change in the couples’ relationship by moving overseas and marital friction over religion.

Free Research Field

家族心理学　生涯発達心理学