The Role of Spirituality Well-being, Forgiveness, and Marital Self-Disclosure in Internet Infidelity in Couples: A Survey Study

The rapid extent of the internet and the social networks play an important role in the prevalence of internet infidelity in Iranian couples. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence of internet infidelity in couples and the role of spiritual well-being, forgiveness, and marital self-disclosure in discriminating the couples with and without internet infidelity. The survey research method was correlation with the discrimination analysis method. The Statistical population included all couples under 40 years old in 4 cities in Iran (N=7000) 387 couples (387 females and 387 males) were selected by stratified random sampling method in 2019. Spiritual Health Paloutzian and Ellison 1991 Decisional and Emotional Forgiveness Hook 2007, Marital Disclosure Waring, Holden et al. 1998 and internet infidelity Docan-Morgan and Docan 2007 Scales were used for data collection. The data were analyzed using discriminant analysis. Results showed that 24.34% of couples (20.90% internet-friendly activities, 16.14% internet emotional activities, and 30.42% internet sexual activities) had internet infidelity and the amount of internet infidelity and its dimensions were higher in men than women. Results showed that marital self-disclosure (especially, sexual and imbalance self-disclosure), spirituality well-being (especially, religious well-being), and emotional forgiveness had a significant role in predicting group membership in couples with and without internet infidelity. In other words, these variables predicted the membership in both groups (P value =0.01). Based on the results of the present study, psychologists and family counselors can identify the predictive variables of internet infidelity, and provide marital counseling by strengthening them.