So Boing-Boing ran a story a few days back: 1939 marital rating scale for wives – Boing Boing
George W. Crane, MD, was a marriage counselor and wrote a syndicated national newspaper column called “The Worry Clinic.” He developed a test in the late 1930s called the Marital Rating Scale — Wife’s Chart.
Actually, it turns out (due to someone who quite nicely scanned the whole thing to Flickr) that the test has both a Marital Rating Scale for Husbands and Wives. And while, mebbe, the Wifely Test is a bit more sexist than the Husbandly page, there’s plenty of … um … interesting cultural items in both categories.
One accures wifely demerits on the test for “wears red nail polish,” “wears pajamas while cooking” (or “wears pajamas instead of a nightgown”), “fails to wash top of milk bottle before opening it,” and “insists on driving the car when husband is along.” Hubbies can get demerits for “argues with or curses other rmotorists,” “objects to wife’s driving auto,” or being “angry if newspaper is disarranged.”
The test was based on interviews with 600 husbands and 600 wives, in which they listed “the chief merits and demerits” of their spouses, further weighted by Crane based on “my judgment as a psychologist and physician.” (Commentary from the APA.) And, yes, someone really needs to translate this into an online test.
For what it’s worth, doing it manually, and without going into actual scores, Margie and I both ranked as “Very Superior.” Ahem.
Now, if only she darned my socks and wouldn’t put her cold feet on me at night. *Sigh* At least we scored big-time on the “ardent” and “delighted” “marital congress” questions …