What Is the Prepare/Enrich Assessment — And Why It's the Most Effective Premarital Tool Available

If you have started researching premarital counseling, you may have come across the name Prepare/Enrich. Maybe your pastor mentioned it. Maybe you found it in a Google search. Either way — it is worth understanding what it actually is, because it is not what most people assume.

It is not a personality quiz. It is not a compatibility test designed to tell you whether you should get married. It is one of the most thoroughly researched premarital assessment tools available — and it has been used with millions of couples across decades of clinical practice.

What Prepare/Enrich actually measures

The Prepare/Enrich assessment is a comprehensive, research-validated inventory that measures a couple's strengths and growth areas across a wide range of domains that are directly predictive of long-term marital satisfaction. These include:

Communication — how you express needs, handle disagreements, and listen to each other under stress.

Conflict resolution — the patterns each of you uses when tension arises, and whether those patterns tend to escalate or resolve.

Financial management — expectations, habits, and values around money, which remains one of the leading sources of conflict in marriage.

Leisure activities — how you spend time, and whether those patterns align or create friction.

Sexual expectations — what each person is bringing into the marriage in terms of expectations, communication, and history.

Family of origin — the patterns, values, and dynamics from each person's family that will inevitably show up in the marriage.

Spiritual beliefs — alignment, differences, and how faith functions in each person's daily life and decision-making.

Relationship roles — assumptions about who does what, and whether those assumptions are shared.

The assessment is completed individually and online before the counseling sessions begin. Each person answers honestly — without knowing how their partner is responding. The results are then brought into the counseling process, where a certified facilitator uses them to open structured, honest conversations about what was revealed.

Why individual completion matters

One of the most valuable features of Prepare/Enrich is that each partner completes it separately. This matters more than it might seem. Couples who complete assessments together — or who discuss their answers before submitting — tend to converge toward agreement rather than revealing their actual individual perspectives. When each person answers honestly and privately, the results reflect what each person actually thinks and feels — not what they think they are supposed to say.

The gaps between partners' responses are often where the most important conversations live.

What the research says

The Prepare/Enrich assessment has been studied extensively. Research has consistently shown that couples who complete a structured premarital program that includes a validated assessment report higher levels of marital satisfaction, better communication, and greater confidence in their ability to navigate conflict. Studies have also shown that premarital education can reduce the risk of divorce.

This is not anecdotal. It is what the data shows across decades of research with diverse populations.

The Scriptural case for this kind of preparation

Proverbs 15:22 says that plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed. The Prepare/Enrich assessment is, at its core, a tool for gathering honest, structured information — about yourself, your partner, and the patterns that will shape your marriage. It is wisdom made visible.

Matthew 7:24 records Jesus describing the wise builder as one who hears his words and puts them into practice — who builds on rock rather than sand. Preparation is not a lack of faith. It is faithfulness. It is taking the covenant seriously enough to build it on solid ground.

Who can administer the Prepare/Enrich assessment?

The Prepare/Enrich assessment must be administered by a certified facilitator. Certification requires specific training in how to interpret the results, facilitate the conversations the assessment is designed to generate, and use the material clinically and ethically. Not every pastor or counselor who mentions Prepare/Enrich is certified to administer it.

At Glad Oaks Counseling, the Prepare/Enrich assessment is administered by myself, a certified facilitator with clinical training in couples' dynamics. In Article 3, we will walk through why working with a licensed Christian therapist for this process makes a specific and meaningful difference.