06:46 AM PST on Friday, February 13, 2004

By MIMI JUNG / KING 5 News

SEATTLE – The sobering flip side to Valentine's Day: divorce.

It is really quite disheartening when you realize 50 percent of marriages end in divorce.

Now, local researchers can predict who will part ways just by doing a little math.

They say a new formula determines whether your relationship really adds up to wedded bliss.

Most couples strive to have the secrets to a lasting marriage, but do they know what leads to divorce?

A marital researcher and two University of Washington mathematicians announced Thursday they've come up with a mathematical model that predicts which couples will get a divorce.

KING Fifty percent of all marriages end in divorce.

“The mathematics really gives you a spacial map of what's going on in the relationship,” said Kristin Swanson, UW mathematician.

After they looked at more than 700 couples who had a 15-minute conversation with each other, they were able to determine who had marital bliss.

“Just turning down the sound, looking at facial expressions, we can predict what's going to happen to a marriage,” said John Gottman, marital researcher.

They predicted that half of the couples studied would end in divorce and they were 94 percent accurate.

“The basic finding that we have is that whose relationships last and get happier all the time are actually very gentle in the way they deal with conflict,” said Gottman.

Researchers hope these "mathematics of marriage" will help therapists with couples before they end in Splitsville.

After looking at hours and hours of video, the professionals say the key to a successful marriage is communication and the most poisonous things to a marriage are contempt and anger.

The study started in the early 1990s and continues today.

Some of the couples who stayed together are now participating in research about how their children impact their marriage.