An offer needs room to be declined
Read five original prompts about acknowledging an action, listening without demanding forgiveness, proposing a small change and checking whether it is welcome.
A complete five-item mean describes your reported repair-related actions. It does not establish that an offer was accepted, effective or sufficient.
An attempted repair and its reception are different
This group asks about naming your own specific action, listening without asking for immediate forgiveness, offering a small alternative, checking whether a gesture is welcome and reviewing an agreed change when that check is welcome. These are reports about your actions, not evidence of their impact. You may sincerely offer something that the other person does not want. Acknowledging one act also does not settle every consequence. Keep intention, action, reception and outcome separate when reading the mean.
A worked example without compensation
Responses of 5, 3, 4, 2 and 4 give a sum of 18 and a mean of 18/5 = 3.6. No item is reverse-scored and there is no total across the four groups. In particular, this 3.6 is not added to or subtracted from a verbal-escalation mean. A later repair offer does not cancel an earlier harmful act. Two identical means can also conceal different answers about listening and consent, so the summary is not a certificate of a successful apology.
Offer a specific alternative without a condition
For an ordinary interrupted conversation, you might say: “I interrupted you twice. Next time I want to wait until you finish. Would you like to say anything now, or would you prefer space?” The other person can choose either option or neither. A counterexample is offering a gift on condition that the disagreement be forgotten. Gifts, humour, touch and apologies are not automatically welcome, and the test does not authorise using any of them to obtain forgiveness or contact.
A change can need time without creating a debt
Practical follow-through, a changed agreement or a decision to keep distance may matter more than an immediate gesture. The questionnaire cannot determine what would be adequate for a particular situation. A check-in should itself be welcome; repeated requests for confirmation can become unwanted contact. The person affected does not owe reassurance because a repair was offered. Nor does a low reported frequency prove that nothing was done, because the relevant opportunities and another person’s preferences are not observed here.
Repair is not a relationship-quality score
These prompts share topics with apology and accountability, but they are not the site’s apology-language preference form. That form asks what a person values when receiving an apology; this one asks about reported actions during ordinary disagreements. Neither result can stand in for the other. The four process areas are not independent validated factors or a required order, and higher or equal means do not show a healthy balance. No single group becomes your assigned love fight style.
Unscored never means an unsuccessful person
A missing relevant occasion, uncertainty or a choice not to answer can be unscored. All five numeric answers are necessary for this group’s mean, without zero replacement, middle-value imputation or averaging only the answered items. Other complete groups keep their own means. All twenty unscored choices can complete the exercise and every guide remains free. You do not need to apologise, create a repair attempt or seek another person’s evaluation to fill a gap in the questionnaire.
Original reading, without inherited validity
The research used as background distinguishes recovery after a conflict from resolving its subject. It did not test these new questions or establish their relation to forgiveness, satisfaction or future separation. This edition has no established reliability, local norms, cross-language equivalence or meaningful-change threshold. Self-reports can be affected by memory and expectations. They cannot certify sincerity, diagnose another person, prove that harm was repaired or determine whether a relationship should continue. The four-week window remains an editorial recall aid.
Choose accountability without demanding a response
If useful, privately name one action you can change within your control and how you would recognise whether you followed through. Decide separately whether telling the other person is wanted, appropriate and safe. They may decline a gesture or a discussion, and you can respect that without asking them to validate your result. No score requires forgiveness, reconciliation, physical closeness or renewed contact. If threats or coercion are present, you may stop here and prioritise protection rather than a repair exercise.