The adult attachment interview and self‐reports of romantic attachment: Associations across domains and methods

Two lines of research on adult attachment have emerged; both are based on Bowlby and Ainsworth's attachment theory, which in turn relies on evolutionary theory. Investigators in one tradition use the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) to assess “state of mind with respect to attachment.” The AAI has been validated primarily by its ability to predict the attachment classification of an interviewee's child in Ainsworth's “strange situation.” Investigators in the second tradition use self‐report measures to assess romantic “attachment style.” The self‐report measures have been validated by their ability to predict features of romantic/marital relationships. Although the two constructs. state of mind and romantic attachment, are importantly different and so would not be expected to relate highly, some of their components, especially ability to depend on attachment figures, should be related if both stem from a person's attachment history. We report associations between components, or aspects, of the two measures. Overlap occurs mainly in the areas of comfort depending on attachment figures and comfort serving as an attachment figure for others. Implications of the findings for attachment theory and research, as well as for evolutionary psychology, are discussed.     

Electroencephalographic responses to photographs: a case study of three women with distinct adult attachment interview classifications

This preliminary study explored whether neurophysiological responses to visual stimuli, including attachment-related pictures, differed based on attachment status. Along with self-reported valence ratings and reaction times, recorded electroencephalographic (EEG) responses to a total of 100 images, 25 each of Positive, Negative, Neutral, and Personal (each participant's parents and child), were analyzed within and among three mothers with three attachment statuses (Dismissing, Preoccupied, and Secure), as judged by the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). All three mothers gave their highest pleasantness ratings for Personal photographs. However, differences emerged when cross-region Alpha2 activation patterns in response to each picture type were compared amongst attachment categories. Alpha2 activation recorded during viewing of the participants' children's photographs was similar to viewing Negative pictures for mothers with insecure (Dismissing and Preoccupied) status; whereas the Alpha2 activation of the mother with Secure status towards photographs of her child was similar to Positive pictures. Different patterns of hemispheric asymmetry in Beta1 frequency when processing different picture types were also found. The mother with Dismissing status showed significantly stronger left-hemisphere Beta1 activation across all image types. The Preoccupied mother showed significantly stronger right-hemisphere Beta1 activation for all but the Neutral images, during which activation did not differ between the two hemispheres. The mother with Secure status showed significantly stronger Beta1 activation in the left hemisphere for all but parental Personal photos, during which activation did not differ between the two hemispheres. Implications from the current findings and future research possibilities are discussed.     

The adult attachment interview and the relationship questionnaire: Relations to reports of mothers and partners

The study asked the following questions: How do interview and self-report assessments of attachment status correspond? What is the relation between attachment status assessed by these methods to self-reports of relationships with mothers and partners? Participants were 53 married white women assessed with the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), and the Relationship Questionnaire (RQ), and a variety of questionnaires assessing love, trust, and closeness in relationships with mothers and partners. Results indicated a trend toward a relation between AAI and RQ classifications: 81% of women classified as Secure with the AAI identified themselves as Secure with the RQ, but only 42% of AAI-Insecure women identified themselves as Insecure with the RQ. Secure and Insecure AAI groups did not differ in their reports of mothers or partners, whereas Secure and Insecure RQ groups did. Results indicated classifications derived from the measures are not equivalent.     

Dissociation and the parent-infant dialogue: a longitudinal perspective from attachment research

Two longitudinal attachment studies of families at social risk have now followed their cohorts of infants to late adolescence. Several key findings have emerged related to outcomes of interest to psychoanalysts. First, data from both studies indicate that disorganized attachment behaviors in infancy are important precursors of later dissociative symptomatology. Second, this early vulnerability is related to patterns of parent-infant affective communication, particularly quieter behaviors like emotional unavailability or role reversal, and does not appear to reside in the infant alone. Finally, the results suggest that the quality of the attachment relationship may in part account for why some people exposed to later trauma develop dissociative symptoms and others do not. To paraphrase Dori Laub (1993), the mother's seeing and not knowing in infancy may be a precondition of her child's knowing and not knowing in late adolescence. It remains unclear, however, whether the early relationship is predictive due primarily to the onset of an internal defensive process in infancy or whether its predictive power resides primarily in enduring patterns of parent-child dialogue that continually reinforce the child's segregated and contradictory mental contents.     

Discourse,memory, and the adult attachment interview: A note with emphasis on the emerging cannot classify category

This brief report focuses on the emergence of a new Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) category, Cannot Classify. The Adult Attachment Interview classification system is discussed with emphasis upon differences in AAI categories as they relate to strategies or lapses in strategy for the integration and focus of attention and memory. The Cannot Classify category is understood to differ from the other AAI categories in that it appears to represent a global breakdown in the organization and maintenance of a singular strategy for adhering to the discourse tasks of the AAI. Some recent findings and speculations regarding clinical implications of the Cannot Classify category are provided.     

The impact of adult attachment style on organizational commitment and adult attachment in the workplace

Adult attachment style has only recently been considered as having a role in explaining work behavior. The present research aimed to explore the impact of adult attachment style, assessed by the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), on organizational commitment (OC) and on adult attachment in the workplace (AAW). We hypothesized that a secure attachment style would be positively related to affective and normative commitment, while preoccupied and avoidant styles would be negatively related to affective commitment; we also hypothesized that there would be a correspondence between the AAI categories and the AAW dimensions. Using the AAI categories as group variable, analysis of average OC and AAW scores confirmed the hypotheses. Secure workers had a higher mean score for affective commitment than avoidant and preoccupied workers; normative commitment was higher in avoidant than in secure and preoccupied workers; continuance commitment was higher in preoccupied than in secure and avoidant workers. Moreover, AAI categories converged with AAW dimensions: secure workers had higher secure AAW scores than avoidant and preoccupied workers; avoidant workers had higher avoidant AAW scores than secure and preoccupied workers; preoccupied workers had higher preoccupied AAW scores than secure and avoidant workers.     

The secure-base hypothesis: Global attachment, attachment to counselor, and session exploration in psychotherapy

This study explored J. Bowlby's (1988) secure-base hypothesis, which predicts that a client's secure attachment to the therapist, as well as the client's and the therapist's global attachment security, will facilitate in-session exploration. Volunteer clients (N = 59) and trainee counselors (N = 59) in short-term therapy completed the Experiences in Close Relationship Scale (K. A. Brennan, C. L. Clark, & P. R. Shaver, 1998) as a measure of adult global romantic and peer attachment orientations; the Client Attachment to Therapist Scale (B. Mallinckrodt, D. L. Gantt, & H. M. Coble, 1995) as a measure of attachment to counselor; the Working Alliance Inventory (A. O. Horvath & L. Greenberg, 1989) as a measure of working alliance; and the Session Evaluation Questionnaire-Depth Subscale (W. B. Stiles & J. S. Snow, 1984) as a measure of session depth. In line with Bowlby's hypothesis, the findings suggest that session depth is related to the client's experience of attachment security with the counselor and that counselor global attachment moderates the relationship between client global attachment and session exploration. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved).     

The emotional integration of childhood experience: physiological, facial expressive, and self-reported emotional response during the adult attachment interview

Attachment researchers claim that individual differences in how adults talk about their early memories reflect qualitatively distinct organizations of emotion regarding childhood experiences with caregivers. Testing this assumption, the present study examined the relationship between attachment dimensions and physiological, facial expressive, as well as self-reported emotional responses during the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Consistent with theoretical predictions, more prototypically secure adults behaviorally expressed and reported experiencing emotion consistent with the valence of the childhood events they described. Insecure adults also showed distinctive and theoretically anticipated forms of emotional response: Dismissing participants evidenced increased electrodermal activity during the interview, a sign of emotional suppression, whereas preoccupied adults showed reliable discrepancies between the valence of their inferred childhood experiences and their facial expressive as well as reported emotion during the AAI. Results substantiate a case that the AAI reflects individual differences in emotion regulation that conceptually parallel observations of attachment relationships in infancy.     

'Dialectical process' and 'constructive method': micro-analysis of relational process in an example from parent-infant psychotherapy

Jung defined experience that takes place between therapist and patient as 'dialectical process', achieved through 'constructive method'. Perspectives from attachment theory, neurobiology, cognitive science, systems thinking and infancy research confirm and extend his view of the centrality of relational process in the development of self. Interactional experiences are embedded within the history of the primary parent-infant relationship and structure within the mind implicit patterns of relating. These patterns influence capacities for managing a whole lifetime of affective relational experience within the self and with others. This paper shows how parent-infant psychotherapy seeks to intervene during the formation of disturbed relational patterns. I offer detailed micro-analysis of the moment-to-moment 'dialectical process' that a mother, her four-month-old infant and myself 'constructed' together.     

Reconceptualizing adult attachment relationships: A network perspective

This article explores attachment relationships from a network theory perspective: Correlations among behaviors, beliefs, and feelings related to attachment are hypothesized to stem from causal relations. The authors used two data sets that assessed relationships with four attachment figures (mother, father, romantic partner, and best friend) using the Relationship Structures Questionnaire. Separate networks (Gaussian Graphical Models) were estimated based on 10 items for each attachment figure. Across networks in Study 1 (N = 310), items related to anxiety, seeking support, and discomfort disclosing feelings clustered with other items from their respective domains; a trust‐related item bridged the clusters. Study 2 replicated these findings in a larger and more diverse sample (N = 3,710). The potential of network analysis for advancing the study of attachment is discussed.