Although bias towards perceiving spousal criticism is related to dysphoria and marital discord (Smith & Peterson, 2008), the bias construct has received insufficient elaboration. We explicated the criticality bias construct by exploring its correlates and incremental validity relative to perceived criticism, marital attributions, and negative affect. 118 couples completed self-report measures and undertook a videotaped discussion task. Signal detection analyses of both spouses' and outside observers' ratings of discussions produced bias indices. Criticality bias evidenced a pattern of convergent and discriminant validity mirroring perceived criticism's (Renshaw, 2008). Bias also provided incremental validity beyond perceived criticism, marital attributions, and negative affect to the prediction of behavior. Bias may be a dysfunctional way to view marital events and a stress generation process.Keywords criticality bias; criticism; depression; marital adjustment; stress generation Explication of Interspousal Criticality BiasCriticism from close relatives predicts poor treatment response and higher rates of relapse across a wide variety of psychiatric disorders and physical illnesses, including depression (Wearden, Tarrier, Barrowclough, Zastowny, & Rahill, 2000). Criticism is also linked to marital distress (Hooley & Teasdale, 1989;Lynch, Robins, Morse, 2001). Furthermore, relations between criticism and both depression and marital distress hold across several types of criticism, namely, perceived criticism as self-reported by spouses and expressed criticism, as coded by outside observers (Hooley & Teasdale, 1989). Those who are depressed or maritally discordant also over-perceive spousal criticism by a process that we refer to as "criticality bias" (Smith & Peterson, 2008).Given the associations among depression, marital discord, and various types of criticism, and the potentially broad range of applications of this research given criticism's status as a generalized stressor across physical and emotional disorders (Hooley & Gotlib, 2000;Wearden et al., 2000), it is important to clearly explicate the nature of central criticism constructs, such as perceived criticism, expressed criticism, and criticality bias. The perceived criticism construct has already been explicated to a substantial degree by studies that demonstrate a compelling pattern of convergent and discriminant validity associations (Chambless & Blake, *Corresponding author. Tel.: +574 631 9640; fax: +574 631 8883., E-mail addresses: E-mail: kpeters1@nd.edu (K. M. Peterson), Email: dsmith11@nd.edu (D. A. Smith), E-mail: cwindle@nd.edu (C. R. Windle). Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discover...

Gender role conflict (GRC) studies have shown that husbands' GRC is related to their wives' emotional and marital adjustment. Studies in the marital literature have shown that husbands' withdrawal is also associated with wives' dysphoria and marital adjustment. This study investigated whether husbands' withdrawal is related to their GRC and whether withdrawal moderates the relationship between husbands' GRC and wives' dysphoria and marital adjustment. One hundred fifty married couples engaged in 10-min marital interactions that were videotaped and coded for each spouse's demand/withdraw behavior. Two aspects of GRC-restricted emotionality and restricted affectionate behavior between men-were associated with husbands' withdrawal. Husbands' withdrawal also moderated the association between GRC and wives' marital adjustment.

Seventy-two married couples participated in a study of husband gender role conflict and interpersonal criticism and wife psychological and marital adjustment. Participants were recruited from a community in the Midwestern USA. Husband criticism was measured using self-report, wife-report, and trained coder ratings of an audiotaped task in which husbands described their wives and their relationship with their wives. Hypothesized associations between husband gender role conflict and husband interspousal criticism were supported. In addition, all three measures of husband criticism were found to mediate the relationship between husband gender role conflict and wife marital adjustment. However, only selfand wife-reported criticism by husbands significantly mediated the relationship between husband gender role conflict and wife depressive symptoms.

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