I had to laugh, I was reading an article where psychologists were discussing a test used back in 1939 that assessed the ‘performance’ of a wife. Depending on the answers, she was awarded points or lost points. Reading the ‘wife’s chart’ is pretty entertaining from the modern perspective, because I don’t think we’ve changed as much as a lot of people would like to think we’ve changed.
Demerits
On the demerits list, give yourself a point for each of these that is true unless otherwise noted.
- Slow in coming to bed — delays until husband is almost asleep
- Doesn’t like children (5 points)
- Fails to sew on buttons or darn socks regularly
- Wears soiled or ragged dresses and aprons around the house
- Wears red nail polish
- Often late for appointments (5)
- Seams in hose are often crooked
- Goes to bed with curlers in her hair or face cream
- Puts her cold feet on her husband to warm them at night
- Is a back seat driver
- Flirts with other men at parties (5)
- Is suspicious and jealous (5)
For me personally, my demerit score is at 5.
Merits
Give yourself 1 point for each of these unless marked otherwise.
- A good hostess – even to unexpected guests
- Has meals on time
- Can carry on an interesting conversation
- Can play a musical instrument
- Dresses for breakfast
- Neat housekeeper – tidy and clean
- Personally puts the children to bed
- Never goes to bed angry, always makes up first (5)
- Asks husband’s opinions regarding important decisions and purchases
- Good sense of humor – jolly and gay
- Religious – sends children to Church and Sunday School and attends herself (10)
- Lets her husband sleep late on all holidays and Sundays
For me personally, my merit score is: 20
Now subtract your demerits from your merits. So in my case that’s 15. Now the scoring is based on 100 points, so I’m guestimating this based on averages, but it should be something like the following:
20-25 points – Very Superior
15-19 points – Superior
10-14 points – Average
5-10 points – Poor
0-4 points – Very poor
My husband rated my score as a 19. So while I think I am very superior, he thinks I am just superior. The idea behind the test is provide feedback from the husband and the wife on the ‘quality’ of their marriage.
While I find the test to be pretty chauvinistic because it grades the marriage on the wife’s performance (it takes more than 1 to make a marriage) – I also find it telling that many of these ‘initial’ questions save the dated ones like ‘seams’ in the stockings actually apply in the modern marriage.
How do you score?