Centrality of Religiosity and Dyadic Coping in Close Romantic Relationships: Actor Partner Interdependence Model

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Religion plays an important role in the lives of many people. The authors of the article coped with the purpose of the study, which was to "better understand the mechanisms of behavior of loved ones under stress in the context of the central role of religiosity."
The study shows that "higher religiosity means less risk of divorce, greater harmony, happiness and satisfaction in relationships, higher self-esteem and optimism, greater commitment, intimacy and better communication."
The authors of the article also note that the research results show that "depending on religiously motivated activities, religiosity can also hinder relationships. An inappropriate type of religiosity of the spouses can lead to a deterioration in the functioning of the relationship."
The study is relevant and interesting, but in our opinion, a much larger sample is required to formulate conclusions, although this number of respondents is also acceptable. Since there are a diverse number of types of partner cohabitation in the modern world, I would like to see a study of not only "7 civil marriages and 44 cohabitations that were identified as non-religious couples based on the concept of central religiosity", but also homosexual partners and their attitude to religion. All these problems, of course, could affect the final results of the study.
I agree that there is a need for additional research, "including long-term studies on the relationship between individual religious coping strategies, dyadic coping and the functioning of relationships."
I repeat that this study is very relevant and will help to raise the interest of scientists in this topic.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for your comments appreciating our work. Regarding your suggestion on the types of relationships, we've decided to include it in our limitations section:

In the present study, however, there are a number of limitations, such as the cross-sectional design and the self-reported data. Additionally, our sample was relatively small (116 couples); 30% of participants were students with a short relationship (up to 5 years), and 6.4% lived separately. Compared to catholic marriages, there were only 7 civil marriages and 44 cohabitants that were identified as non-religious couples on the basis of the centrality of religiosity concept. All these issues could certainly have had an impact on the final results of the research.

In order to obtain more reliable results, subsequent studies should focus on representative groups of religious and civil marriages, and homosexual couples, which are also more homogeneous in terms of age and relationship duration. It would also be interesting to try to define the meaning of belonging to a specific cohort (older and younger, longer and shorter relationship) in order to understand the relationship between religiosity and dyadic coping. In order to better understand the mechanism that activates the motivation to support partner mechanisms, in future research it would possibly also be worthwhile to focus on the relationship between individual strategies, dyadic strategies, and social support, including the type of stress experienced by couples, its origin, and the sequence of impact on individual partners (Bodenmann, 2005). There is also a need for more research, including longitudinal studies that focus on the relationships between individual religious coping strategies, dyadic coping, and relationship functioning. Religiosity is a complex concept that can be difficult to define in terms of self-esteem measures. Future research should also include interviews and observational data.

We also decided to remove the information about the sexual orientation of the couples in the abstract as irrelevant.

Best regards

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you very much for having me to review the manuscript entitled: "Centrality of Religiosity and Dyadic Coping in Close Romantic 2 Relationships: Dyadic Approach". The following are a series of considerations, suggestions and recommendations:

TITLE

It is not excessively long and provides an overall picture of the subject matter. However, it repeats the word "dyadic". The title should be modified so that it is equally clear but not redundant.

ABSTRACT

The abstract follows a logical and traditional internal structure.

It should be assessed whether it is relevant to give information about the sexual orientation of couples in the abstract.

With regard to the number of subjects, this number allows for various further statistical analyses.

The mean age and standard deviation of the participants, both men and women, could be included. 

KEYWORDS

Some very relevant words have been selected. However, the number is small. Authors are advised to review the rules of the Journal and try to use the maximum number of keywords that the Journal allows. This will increase the impact of the article and also help to make it easier to find in search engines.

On the other hand, if all the words are equally relevant, the keywords should be in alphabetical order.

In addition, one of the words should refer to the research design. 

INTRODUCTION

A review of the bibliography citation rules should be made and a review of the entire manuscript should be made.

Throughout the introduction the main concepts of the study are developed. They are abstract concepts and for this reason the authors have dedicated several paragraphs to describe them. Afterwards, the information is presented in a figure that is intended to be the base model on which the topic can be further investigated. With regard to the figure, I would like to ask the authors whether they have taken into consideration sociodemographic variables or the type of couple or union in the model itself. 

Section 1.2. should relate not only to a general objective, but to a series of specific objectives (and number them). And, since there is a model based on a theoretical framework, it should also include the hypotheses (again numbered) that are expected to be confirmed. 

METHOD

In this section, it is recommended to include an example of an item from the instrument used. The rest of the data is correct and, in addition, the authors provide Cronbach's alpha value.

RESULTS

The results are presented differentiating between a more descriptive analysis and another analysis referring to the model. The structure allows differentiation between the initial data and the more complex and inferential data. Another option would have been to present the data based on specific objectives previously described at the end of the Introduction. In any case, the option chosen by the authors is valid. 

The tables help to understand the information. Regarding the format, it is necessary to revise it to prevent columns from moving and numbers from shifting.

DISCUSSION

Although the differences between women and men are described (which could be one of the specific objectives numbered in the Introduction), I would like the authors to elaborate more on the implications of having developed two models in the case of women and nine models in the case of men (which appear in Tables 4 and 5 respectively).

More recent information is also lacking in the Discussion. In the Introduction, more current references have been used and it would be relevant to contrast this information with the results obtained. 

A study with such a complexity of concepts and terms as the current one should place greater emphasis on the discussion section, providing it with more updated references, already used in the introduction (most of them) and using hypotheses that are confirmed or not. 

CONCLUSIONS

Although it is not a relevant aspect, it would be interesting if the conclusions were shorter and more concrete. There are several paragraphs that could be moved to the Discussion section, for example, those relating to the limitations of the study, strengths and future lines of research). In the discussion section, the authors should state very clearly what they have obtained so that the reader can easily know what the main results and conclusions are. 

REFERENCES

It is necessary to review the format, unify the way of putting the doi, eliminate parentheses, etc.

In short, this is a manuscript that analyzes a subject that is not very common. Its contributions are interesting. It is necessary to clarify the concepts, update the references, structure and clearly state what are the objectives to be achieved and what are the starting hypotheses. Thank you for your attention. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Please see the attachment.

Thank you very much

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf