The Marriage Alliance of Central Virginia

Building Stronger Families Through Stronger Marriages For A Stronger Community.

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PREPARE/ENRICH

A solid approach to marriage preparation and marriage enhancement training.

The next PREPARE/ENRICH training will be held on Saturday, March 10, 2007 at Liberty University.

For more information, or to register, contact Larry Compter at the Marriage Alliance office 434-455-2117 or send an email to marriagealliance@verizon.net.

WHAT IS PREPARE/ENRICH?

The Prepare/Enrich Training Workshop teaches and certifies participants to administer, interpret, and counsel using the marriage inventory instruments PREPARE, PREPARE-MC, PREPARE-CC, ENRICH, AND MATE.

Each of these inventories is a 165-item questionnaire assessing relationship strength and growth areas for couples.  Areas assessed include: communication, conflict resolution, personality issues, marriage expectations, financial management, leisure activities, sexual relationship, children/parenting, family/friends, role relationship, spiritual beliefs, couple closeness, family closeness, couple flexibility, and family flexibility.

The inventories are comprehensive, diagnostically valuable and designed to generate a meaningful dialogue between the counselor and the couple.  They can be used by pastors, professional counselors and laypeople.  A very effective approach has been to have an experienced “mentor” couple in a stable, healthy marriage work with the couple taking the inventory.  (They must use the tool in cooperation with a supervising trainer.)

Want more information?  Contact Larry Compter at MACV (marriagealliance@verizon.net), or go to the Prepare/Enrich website at www.buildingrelationships.com.

HOW EFFECTIVE IS PREPARE/ENRICH?

The PREPARE/ENRICH inventories have been scientifically developed to have high levels of reliability, validity, and clinical utility.

Twenty areas assessed in each of the four couple inventories

A.   Focuses on significant issues for couples (13 scales)

Communication                 Children and parenting

Conflict resolution              Family and friends

Personality issues             Realistic expectations

Financial management     Cohabitation issues

Marital satisfaction            Idealistic distortion

Leisure activities               Role relationship

Spiritual beliefs

B.   Personality assessment (4 scales)

           Assertiveness            Avoidance

     Self confidence          Partner dominance

C.  Couple and family map (4 scales)

     Family map used to describe family of origin

     Couple map used to describe type of marriage/couple relationship

Scientifically developed and tested:

           National norms based on:     350,000 couples for PREPARE

                                                            150,000 couples for PREPARE-MC

                                                            150,000 couples for ENRICH     

High levels of validity and reliability:

Prepare has validity in that it discriminates premarital couples that get divorced from those that are happily married with about 80-85% accuracy. Reliability is high (alpha reliability of .80 - .85)

PREPARE/ENRICH HELPS COUPLES TO MAKE GOOD DECISIONS ABOUT MARRIAGE,

AND HELPS MARRIED COUPLES STRENGTHEN THEIR MARRIAGE.