American Psychologist. Monogr Soc Res Child Dev. Lyons-ruth K. Attachment relationships among children with aggressive behavior problems: The role of disorganized early attachment patterns. J Consult Clin Psychol. Childhood attachment and adult personality: A life history perspective. Self and Identity. The nature of the child's tie to his mother. International Journal of Psychoanalysis. The development of social attachments in infancy. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development.
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I Accept Show Purposes. Table of Contents View All. Table of Contents. Attachment Theory. Stages of Attachement. Patterns of Attachment. Impact of Early Attachment. The Theme of Attachment Theory The central theme of attachment theory is that primary caregivers who are available and responsive to an infant's needs allow the child to develop a sense of security.
Was this page helpful? Thanks for your feedback! Sign Up. What are your concerns? Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy. Bowlby, J. Ainsworth's work was important for at least three reasons. First, she provided one of the first empirical demonstrations of how attachment behavior is patterned in both safe and frightening contexts.
Second, she provided the first empirical taxonomy of individual differences in infant attachment patterns. According to her research, at least three types of children exist: those who are secure in their relationship with their parents, those who are anxious-resistant, and those who are anxious-avoidant.
Finally, she demonstrated that these individual differences were correlated with infant-parent interactions in the home during the first year of life. Children who appear secure in the strange situation, for example, tend to have parents who are responsive to their needs. Children who appear insecure in the strange situation i. In the years that have followed, a number of researchers have demonstrated links between early parental sensitivity and responsiveness and attachment security.
Although Bowlby was primarily focused on understanding the nature of the infant-caregiver relationship, he believed that attachment characterized human experience from "the cradle to the grave.
Hazan and Shaver were two of the first researchers to explore Bowlby's ideas in the context of romantic relationships. According to Hazan and Shaver, the emotional bond that develops between adult romantic partners is partly a function of the same motivational system--the attachment behavioral system--that gives rise to the emotional bond between infants and their caregivers.
Hazan and Shaver noted that the relationship between infants and caregivers and the relationship between adult romantic partners share the following features:. On the basis of these parallels, Hazan and Shaver argued that adult romantic relationships, like infant-caregiver relationships, are attachments, and that romantic love is a property of the attachment behavioral system, as well as the motivational systems that give rise to caregiving and sexuality. The idea that romantic relationships may be attachment relationships has had a profound influence on modern research on close relationships.
There are at least three critical implications of this idea. First, if adult romantic relationships are attachment relationships, then we should observe the same kinds of individual differences in adult relationships that Ainsworth observed in infant-caregiver relationships. We may expect some adults, for example, to be secure in their relationships--to feel confident that their partners will be there for them when needed, and open to depending on others and having others depend on them.
We should expect other adults, in contrast, to be insecure in their relationships. For example, some insecure adults may be anxious-resistant : they worry that others may not love them completely, and be easily frustrated or angered when their attachment needs go unmet. Others may be avoidant : they may appear not to care too much about close relationships, and may prefer not to be too dependent upon other people or to have others be too dependent upon them.
Second, if adult romantic relationships are attachment relationships, then the way adult relationships "work" should be similar to the way infant-caregiver relationships work. In other words, the same kinds of factors that facilitate exploration in children i. The kinds of things that make an attachment figure "desirable" for infants i.
In short, individual differences in attachment should influence relational and personal functioning in adulthood in the same way they do in childhood. Third, whether an adult is secure or insecure in his or her adult relationships may be a partial reflection of his or her experiences with his or her primary caregivers. Bowlby believed that the mental representations or working models i. For example, a secure child tends to believe that others will be there for him or her because previous experiences have led him or her to this conclusion.
Once a child has developed such expectations, he or she will tend to seek out relational experiences that are consistent with those expectations and perceive others in a way that is colored by those beliefs.
According to Bowlby, this kind of process should promote continuity in attachment patterns over the life course, although it is possible that a person's attachment pattern will change if his or her relational experiences are inconsistent with his or her expectations.
In short, if we assume that adult relationships are attachment relationships, it is possible that children who are secure as children will grow up to be secure in their romantic relationships. Or, relatedly, that people who are secure as adults in their relationships with their parents will be more likely to forge secure relationships with new partners. In the sections below I briefly address these three implications in light of early and contemporary research on adult attachment. The earliest research on adult attachment involved studying the association between individual differences in adult attachment and the way people think about their relationships and their memories for what their relationships with their parents are like.
Hazan and Shaver developed a simple questionnaire to measure these individual differences. These individual differences are often referred to as attachment styles , attachment patterns , attachment orientations , or differences in the organization of the attachment system. In short, Hazan and Shaver asked research subjects to read the three paragraphs listed below, and indicate which paragraph best characterized the way they think, feel, and behave in close relationships:.
I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others; I find it difficult to trust them completely, difficult to allow myself to depend on them. Bowlby and Robertson observed that children were unable to be comforted when a parent was absent regardless of whether they were fed or not. According to Bowlby, attachment is distinguished by specific behaviours from children, such as seeking closeness to an attachment figure when feeling upset or threatened Bowlby, Bowlby identified four types of attachment styles: secure, anxious-ambivalent, disorganised and avoidant.
The secure attachment style signifies a warm and loving bond between parent and child. The child feels loved and cared for and develops the ability to form healthy relationships with those around them.
Children with secure attachment styles are active and demonstrate confidence in their interactions with others. Those who develop secure attachment styles in childhood are likely to carry this healthy way of bonding into adulthood and have no problem building long-term relationships without fear of abandonment. Anxious-ambivalent children tend to distrust caregivers, and this insecurity often means that their environment is explored with trepidation rather than excitement. They constantly seek approval from their caregivers and continuously observe their surroundings for fear of being abandoned.
People who developed attachments under this style are usually emotionally dependent in adulthood. They often struggle with expressing their feelings and find it hard understanding emotions — in adulthood; they tend to avoid intimate relationships. Board-certified Clinical Psychologist. Kristina Hallett, Ph. She has a private practice in Suffield, Connecticut. Last updated on September 29, In This Article.
What is an attachment style? The four attachment styles:. Secure attachment. Anxious attachment. Avoidant attachment. Fearful-avoidant attachment aka disorganized.
Relationship Communication An error occurred. Please try again. If this problem persists, contact support mindbodygreen. With Esther Perel. How attachment styles are formed. Secure attachment: Caregivers are responsive and attuned to their child's needs, says Mancao. Anxious attachment: "Caregivers are inconsistent, unpredictable with affections, sometimes overly involved, and intermittently withdrawn," says Suh. It's the unpredictable fluctuation between caregivers being emotionally available and then distant that leads children to be anxious about all their future relationships, Mancao adds.
Avoidant attachment: Caregivers are not responsive, and they are often dismissive and distant, Suh explains. They're consistently emotionally disconnected from their child, "resulting in the child believing that their needs won't get met," Mancao says.
Fearful-avoidant attachment: "The type of an environment that influences a disorganized attachment involves a caregiver who is frightening or traumatizing, leading to the child to experience a deep sense of fear and a lack of trust in others despite wanting close connections," Mancao says. They may be neglectful or even abusive, Suh adds, such that the child develops a "poor understanding of boundaries" and is "confused about what a healthy relationship looks like.
What is your attachment style? I find it relatively easy to get close to others and am comfortable depending on them and having them depend on me. I don't often worry about being abandoned or about someone getting too close to me. I find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I often worry that my partner doesn't really love me or won't want to stay with me.
I want to merge completely with another person, and this desire sometimes scares people away. I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others; I find it difficult to trust them completely, difficult to allow myself to depend on them.
I am nervous when anyone gets too close, and often, love partners want me to be more intimate than I feel comfortable being. The history of attachment theory research. Mary Ainsworth and the strange situation.
Here are some of the patterns they observed:. Some children explored and played freely when their mother was in the room, became distressed when she left, and then were able to be soothed and comforted upon her return.
These children were labeled as securely attached. Some children tended to avoid or ignore mothers even before she left and showed little emotion when left and when she returned. Ainsworth and her colleagues hypothesized that this avoidant behavior masked their true distress, and some further research tracking avoidant infants' heart rates confirmed this theory. These children were labeled as anxious-avoidant.
Some children were already a bit distressed before the mother left, showed significant distress when she did, and were hard to comfort when she returned.
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