Unhappy Singaporeans Marrying?

A Reuters article titled You're a Pain, But Let's Get Married Anyway claimed that in a recent poll of 700+ couples who planned to wed, 39% of them said they were unhappy. Are there really so many couples who are going to marry someone they don't even like?

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singaporean couples may not be happy with their partners but they will still marry them anyway, a global survey on relationships shows.

The poll of 716 couples who planned to wed showed that 39 percent were unhappy in their relationships, the highest proportion of nine societies surveyed by a U.S.-based marriage and family therapy organization.

The poll is the latest unflattering survey of ardor in a wealthy population that chases what is known in local parlance as the Five C's: career, condominium, club, credit cards and cars. [...]

Among those in the survey who consider themselves unhappy, most cited disagreements with their partners on a number of issues, or said they disliked their partners' personality or that there were problems communicating effectively. [...]

Olson said couples in Singapore -- an island of 4.2 million people -- may be suffering because of a reluctance to speak their minds about problems to avoid confrontation.

"They are afraid to say what they think and are afraid to disagree," he said.

My first reaction to that was the survey was phrased in such a way that most Singaporeans misunderstood the question. I mean by unhappy, they could really mean that they wish their to-be-spouse could be more [something] or less [something], instead of what the article implied that they do not feel happy being together with their partners.

I mean seriously I don't seen the 40% of couples who are about to get married looking unhappy/grumpy or marrying for money etc. It really reinforces my belief that self-reporting surveys are bad indications of what the actual situation is.