ABSTRACT
Up to this point, the focus of this text has been the simple collusive pacts that
spouses devise to protect each other and maintain dyadic stability. In this chapter,
a more complex and elaborate type of defensive arrangement is reviewed-one
that entails the complementary meshing of defensive themes from the personal
life histories of each partner. This collusive system has been referred to earlier as a
couple’s mythology (Bagarozzi & Anderson, 1989).
