A Premarital Counseling Questionnaire For Getting To Know Your Intended

Many engaged couples find themselves wanting to know and share everything about each other. However, emotional intimacy and vulnerability can be difficult to develop and maintain—even in a serious, committed relationship. 

Premarital counseling questionnaires can make it easier to initiate discussions about important subjects, like what attributes you love most about your partner, what involvement you expect or want from your parents and in-laws, if you want to have children, and what marital expectations you have. By holding space for these discussions before marriage, you and your future spouse may find yourselves entering marriage with a stronger, healthier, more understanding partnership.

Why you might want to consider trying a premarital questionnaire

Marriage is a serious, often lifelong, commitment. Resources like premarital counseling or couple’s therapy can help you establish healthy, open communication, and help you become more connected as partners.

If you’re interested in improving your relationship quality and satisfaction, but not certain you want to try talk therapy, you might want to consider using premarital questionnaires. While they can—and often are—used in premarital counseling and couple’s therapy, they can often also be completed at home without a therapist, though they may be more useful when taken with a therapist. 

What kinds of questions might be on a premarital counseling questionnaire? 

The following questions, or some variation of these questions, are often seen on premarital questionnaires. Whether you decide to utilize a questionnaire or not, exploring the following questions with your fiancée can help you get to know each other on a deeper level: 

Questions about childhood:

• How would you describe your childhood? 
• Who are your role models for what a healthy relationship might look like?
• Did you have a pet growing up and do you want one in the future? 
• Were you raised in a religious household? How did that shape your religion or spirituality today? Do you view marriage as a religious sacrament?
• How were you parented? Is there something you’d want to do differently with your own children?   

Questions about values and beliefs: 

• What are your expectations for marital roles? 
• How do you think about traditional family roles? For example, do you believe that a man should be the leader/protector/breadwinner of the family?
• What do you value most about marriage? 
• Is divorce an unacceptable option?
• How important is sexual intercourse? How often do you desire to have sexual intercourse per week? 
• If you’re having difficulty performing sexually, would it mean that there is a problem in your relationship? Would it indicate a personal failure? 
• Do you believe that male and female roles in a marriage are inherently different? If so, how?
• If you were to have children, who would do the bulk of parenting/raising them? 

Questions about personality and communication style: 

• What kind of communicator are you? 
• Do you like to lay things out as you see them, or do you tread more lightly? 
• If your partner does or says something that upsets you, do you talk to them about it? 
• When there’s a problem, do you want to solve the problem together? 
• Can you accept when your partner holds a different opinion than your own? 
• Does disagreement indicate that your partner doesn’t value you as much? 
• Do you share how you’re feeling when you’re feeling it, or do you expect your partner should recognize how you’re feeling without having to vocalize it? 
• Do you expect your partner to be able to change if they did something hurtful? 
• Do you feel generally well understood by your partner? 
• Does your partner understand you? 
• Do you share everything with your partner? 
• Do you crave alone time?
• How do you cope with stressors? 
• What inner dialog do you have about yourself?
• What is your love language?

Questions about mental health: 

• Do either of us have a mental disorder or mental health challenge, such as anxiety, eating disorder, depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder? 
• How would you feel about attending individual therapy during a difficult time? What about couple’s therapy?

Questions about family: 

• How do you feel about birth control, including hormonal, chemical, and permanent (surgical) options? 
• Do you envision having children? If so, when, and how many? 
• If you had children, would you want to move closer to family? 
• How often would you want to see your side of the family? And their side of the family?  
• How would you split holiday time between families? 
• What type of parent do you envision yourself being? How would you navigate different parenting styles? 
• What do you want most for your family, happiness or success? 

Questions about conflict and disagreements: 

• What are the things you disagree on? How would you navigate different values or beliefs on things like religion, marital expectations, finances, and parenting? 
• What kinds of things lead to most of your fights?
• How do you handle conflict?  
• When would you know that it’s time to ask for outside help? 
• Is it acceptable for partners to share relationship challenges with close friends and/or family? 

Questions about finances:

• What are your financial goals? 
• What are your career goals? 
• What are your values surrounding money? 
• Do you have expectations that your partner will make a certain amount of money? 
• How do you budget your money? 
• If you and your partner decide to split expenses, how should you do that? For example, should you split expenses based on percentage of income, or go 50-50 on everything? 
• Should both partners be expected to work even if it’s not financially necessary? 
• How do you want to save for retirement? 
• Do you have any debt? 

These are just some of the questions you might encounter on a premarital questionnaire. You and your partner might want to set aside a few occasions to sit down and discuss every section of questions. If there’s an area where you are disagreeing or upset with each other’s answers, you may want to take note of it and bring up those concerns during individual or couple’s therapy. 

Where to find a premarital questionnaire

There are many free premarital questionnaires available on the internet. It may be a good idea to look for a questionnaire from a reputable source, such as this questionnaire from the University of North Carlonia Wilmington. Outside of premarital questionnaires, you and your partner may want to research relationship-building worksheets, such as this Relationship Qualities Worksheet or About Your Partner Worksheet.  

How online therapy can help you form a stronger relationship 

While a premarital questionnaire can be a good resource, it’s often a good idea to speak with a trained professional. Psychotherapists (also called talk therapists) can act as a neutral third party and pick up on nuances you might not notice in your relationship. According to the American Psychological Association (APA), by addressing challenges proactively in premarital counseling, married couples can experience a 30% increase in relationship satisfaction compared to those who do not attend counseling.  

However, while premarital couple’s therapy is usually helpful, it’s often not covered by health insurance, and out-of-pocket payments can be expensive. Additionally, it can be difficult to schedule time for you and your partner to both attend in-person therapy sessions. 

Online couple’s therapy, which is available from licensed professionals on platforms like Regain, is usually more cost-effective and convenient than in-person therapy. And it’s often equally effective. For example, a 2021 study found that online and in-person couple’s therapy are equally effective at establishing a strong therapeutic alliance and improving relationship satisfaction and mental health. 

Takeaway

You and your partner very likely do not know everything about each other, even if you’re in a serious relationship. By taking some intentional time to understand things you might not have asked before—like communication style, marital expectation, financial goals, and family goals—you can gain some further understanding of each other and address any concerns proactively. 

If you don’t know how to start these conversations or encounter challenges along the way, it may be a good idea to reach out to an online couple’s therapist. They can help guide these sometimes-uncomfortable conversations and identify patterns and issues you might not see clearly from your perspective.