Professional Dissertations DMin

Date of Award

2007

Document Type

Project Report

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Ministry DMin

First Advisor

Antonio Estrada

Second Advisor

Ricardo Norton

Third Advisor

Trevor O'Reggio

Abstract

The purpose of this project has been to develop and implement a marital communication seminar to improve the communication abilities of the married couples of the Hispanic Adventist Church in Paterson, New Jersey. Effective communication is a fundamental instrument needed to establish a healthy marital relationship. A healthy marital relationship has a very positive impact on family life, church fellowship, and society. Studies have demonstrated that spouses with good communication skills enjoy healthier and happier marriages and resolve their conflicts better. Therefore, it should be a primary objective to improve marital communication. Hence arises the reason for implementing a marital communication seminar for the Paterson Eastside Church. The seminar project, which was circumscribed to thirty-two couples for a period of ten hours, and incorporated the use of a survey academic and professionally recognized regarding communication abilities (Communication Skills Test-Revised).

The seminar was designed from the survey previously given to the potential participants. This survey determined the areas of greater need regarding the couple's communication. As a result, the seminar was limited to the abilities of active listening and being able to make adequate expressions. The communication barriers between the couples were also covered.

The analysis of the survey results showed the following: first, the participants with greater abilities to communicate showed less communication barriers and vise versa. Second, the couples that exhibited fewer barriers enjoyed a higher level of communication. Third, the participants with greater abilities to communicate showed better levels of communication.

The basic conclusion inferred from this project is that if couples improve their communication abilities, they would decrease their communication barriers and their level of communication would improve. Even though future studies would be necessary to verify the conclusions and recommendations that have been proposed by this project, it is believed that this work will enrich the communication of Hispanic couples; and as a result, their marriage relationships.

Subject Area

Communication in marriage; Marriage--Religious aspects; Paterson Eastside Church (Paterson, N.J.)

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/dmin/654

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