A diagnosis of breast cancer is one of the most traumatic events that threatens a woman's life, but while women adapt to and overcome these threats, they not only experience negative aspects, but also growth. The purpose of this study was to identify the many factors that affect growth, and to provide fundamental information for nursing interventions, which can help the women in their growth.

The participants in this study were 131 married women patients with breast cancer, who were on medical treatment in one of two university hospitals, in Seoul and Chungnam. Data were collected for posttraumatic growth, self-esteem, cancer coping questionnaire, marital intimacy, and body image. The data were analyzed using the SPSS 19.0 program (IBM).

Interpersonal cancer coping, intrapersonal cancer coping (planning) and self-esteem accounted for 29.0% of posttraumatic growth.

These findings indicate that in order to help the women's growth after the trauma of breast cancer, it is necessary to enhance their self-esteem, and to develop psycho-social nursing supportive programs.

The purpose of the study was to investigate the relationships between the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) psychological type and marital satisfaction, divorce proneness, positive affect, and conflict regulation in couple visiting a clinic.

Couples (n=62) who visited "M" couple clinic participated in the study. Data were collected from March to June 2009 using the Marital Satisfaction Scale, Marital Status Inventory, Positive Affect Inventory, and Conflict Regulation Inventory.

The couples showed no significant differences in marital satisfaction, positive affect, and conflict regulation according to similarities between spouses in MBTI types. However, they showed significant differences in divorce proneness of husband according to a similarity in the Sensing/Intuition indicator. They also showed significant differences in divorce proneness, positive affect, and conflict regulation between the couples for ISTJ (Introversion, Sensing, Thinking, Judging) or ESTJ (Extraversion, Sensing, Thinking, Judging) types compared to other couples.

When nurses counsel couples, they should understand that differences in psychological type between spouses affects their marital relationship. In addition, nurses should educate couples on the characteristics of each type according to the couple's types and help them to understand each other, especially for couples where one spouse is the ISTJ/ESTJ type. These interventions will improve marital satisfaction and prevent the divorce in these couples.

This paper reports a randomized controlled trial to investigate the effects of a Marital-relationship enhancement program(MREP) for marital couples.

Volunteer couples from several well-being centers in Seoul were randomly assigned either to a treatment group (n=36), participating in a MREP based on Gottman's “sound marital house” theory, or to a control group (n=35) receiving no treatment. The content of the MREP was provided to the control group after the research was completed. Data was collected from December 2003 to May 2004 using modified versions of the inventories developed by Gottman on marital satisfaction, positive affect, conflict regulation, and communication barriers.

Participants in the experimental group showed significant improvements in marital satisfaction, positive affects, conflict regulation, and communication-barrier scores compared to the control group.

The present program for marital-relationship enhancement is helpful in enhancing marital relationships and regulating conflict between marital couples and, ultimately, may be useful to prevent divorce.