scholarly journals Mind the Gap: Perceived Partner Responsiveness as a Bridge between General and Partner-Specific Attachment Security

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (19) ◽  
pp. 7178
Author(s):  
TeKisha M. Rice ◽  
Madoka Kumashiro ◽  
Ximena B. Arriaga
Keyword(s):  
Romantic Relationships ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
Attachment Security ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Secure Attachment ◽  
Specific Attachment ◽  
Perceived Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Core Idea ◽  
Partner Responsiveness ◽  
A Current

A core idea of attachment theory is that security develops when attachment figures are responsive to a person’s connection needs. Individuals may be more or less secure in different relationships. We hypothesized that individuals who perceive a current relationship partner as being responsive to their needs will feel more secure in that specific relationship, and that the benefits of perceived partner responsiveness would be more pronounced for individuals who generally feel insecure. The current study included 472 individuals (236 couples) in romantic relationships. Consistent with our predictions, individuals who perceived more responsiveness from their partner displayed lower partner-specific attachment anxiety and partner-specific avoidance, especially when they were generally insecure. These findings are discussed in terms of the conditions that promote secure attachment bonds.

Today You Care, Tomorrow You Don’t: Differential Roles of Responsiveness Variability and Average Responsiveness in Romantic Attachment

2020 ◽  
pp. 194855062094411
Author(s):  
Gul Gunaydin ◽  
Emre Selcuk ◽  
Betul Urganci ◽  
Sumeyra Yalcintas
Keyword(s):  
Romantic Attachment ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Attachment Avoidance ◽  
Romantic Couples ◽  
Perceived Responsiveness ◽  
Specific Attachment ◽  
Perceived Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Relational Outcomes ◽  
Partner Responsiveness

Past work has shown that perceived responsiveness is a key predictor of relational outcomes. However, this work has focused solely on average levels of responsiveness and never studied the role of responsiveness variability (consistency of responsiveness) in intimate relationships. The present study addressed this gap by investigating the long-held but scarcely tested tenet that responsiveness variability and average responsiveness play differential roles in romantic attachment. New romantic couples ( N = 151) reported partner-specific attachment anxiety and avoidance in six sessions. Every evening during the 3-week period in between the first two sessions, participants reported perceived partner responsiveness, allowing us to assess both average responsiveness and responsiveness variability. Our findings provided the first empirical evidence that responsiveness variability uniquely predicted increases in partner-specific attachment anxiety, whereas average responsiveness uniquely predicted decreases in partner-specific attachment avoidance. Average responsiveness and responsiveness variability continued to predict attachment orientations assessed about half a year later.

Attachment Security Priming and Domestic Violence: Augmenting Biopsychosocial Treatment of Perpetrators

Partner Abuse ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 202-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth Corvo ◽  
Daniel Sonkin ◽  
Morgan Cooney
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Violence ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
Attachment Style ◽  
Attachment Security ◽  
Theory Development ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Secure Attachment ◽  
Psychological Pain ◽  
Relationship Expectations ◽  
Funding Environment

In spite of an inhospitable policy and funding environment for domestic violence perpetrator treatment, efforts in theory development and practice innovation have persisted. Among them are efforts to understand and treat domestic violence using attachment theory. General principles of attachment theory, as well as concepts more directly connected to violence between intimates and other family members, suggest approaches to working with perpetrators that show promise for emotional growth and behavioral change. One such approach is attachment security priming involving the clinical or experimental activation or evocation of secure attachment style through the use of various prompts or stimuli. Evidence supporting positive results from attachment security priming with potential for addressing domestic violence includes: diminished fear reactions, improved creative problem-solving, reduced psychological pain, persistence in managing uncomfortable feelings, more positive relationship expectations, less attachment anxiety, and modulation of threat-related amygdala reactivity.

When Tonight Is Not the Night: Sexual Rejection Behaviors and Satisfaction in Romantic Relationships

2020 ◽  
Vol 46 (10) ◽  
pp. 1476-1490
Author(s):  
James J. Kim ◽  
Amy Muise ◽  
John K. Sakaluk ◽  
Natalie O. Rosen ◽  
Emily A. Impett
Keyword(s):  
Romantic Relationships ◽  
Sexual Satisfaction ◽  
Conflicts Of Interest ◽  
Cross Sectional Study ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Daily Experience ◽  
Sexual Rejection ◽  
Perceived Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Partner Responsiveness

In most long-term romantic relationships, partners experience sexual conflicts of interest in which one partner declines the other partner’s sexual advances. We investigated the distinct ways people reject a partner’s advances (i.e., with reassuring, hostile, assertive, and deflecting behaviors) in Studies 1 and 2. Using cross-sectional (Study 3) and daily experience methods (Study 4), we investigated how perceptions of a partner’s rejection behaviors are linked with the rejected partner’s relationship and sexual satisfaction. We found robust evidence that perceived partner reassuring behaviors were associated with greater satisfaction, whereas perceived partner hostile behaviors were associated with lower levels of satisfaction. Perceived partner responsiveness was a key mechanism underlying the effects. Findings for assertive and deflecting behaviors were limited, but the effect of deflecting behaviors was qualified by levels of hostile behaviors for sexual satisfaction. Findings provide the first empirical investigation of the specific ways partners can decline one another’s advances to preserve satisfaction.

scholarly journals Secure human attachment can promote support for climate change mitigation

2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (37) ◽  
pp. e2101046118
Author(s):  
Claudia F. Nisa ◽  
Jocelyn J. Bélanger ◽  
Birga M. Schumpe ◽  
Edyta M. Sasin
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
Behavioral Change ◽  
Climate Change Mitigation ◽  
Attachment Security ◽  
Secure Attachment ◽  
National Geographic ◽  
Change Mitigation

Attachment theory is an ethological approach to the development of durable, affective ties between humans. We propose that secure attachment is crucial for understanding climate change mitigation, because the latter is inherently a communal phenomenon resulting from joint action and requiring collective behavioral change. Here, we show that priming attachment security increases acceptance (Study 1: n = 173) and perceived responsibility toward anthropogenic climate change (Study 2: n = 209) via increased empathy for others. Next, we demonstrate that priming attachment security, compared to a standard National Geographic video about climate change, increases monetary donations to a proenvironmental group in politically moderate and conservative individuals (Study 3: n = 196). Finally, through a preregistered field study conducted in the United Arab Emirates (Study 4: n = 143,558 food transactions), we show that, compared to a message related to carbon emissions, an attachment security–based message is associated with a reduction in food waste. Taken together, our work suggests that an avenue to promote climate change mitigation could be grounded in core ethological mechanisms associated with secure attachment.

scholarly journals The Detriments of Unmet Sexual Ideals and Buffering Effect of Sexual Communal Strength

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhonda Nicole Balzarini ◽  
SHaRe Lab ◽  
Kiersten Dobson ◽  
Taylor Kohut ◽  
Stephanie Raposo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Romantic Relationships ◽  
Relationship Quality ◽  
Sexual Satisfaction ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Relational Quality ◽  
Perceived Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Ideal Standards ◽  
Communal Strength ◽  
Partner Responsiveness ◽  
The Ideal

Despite the importance of sex for the maintenance of satisfying romantic relationships, our understanding of a person’s sexual ideals—the traits and attributes a person desires in a sexual partner or experience—and what might buffer against lower satisfaction associated with unmet sexual ideals, is limited. Across four studies including cross-sectional, dyadic, longitudinal, and experimental methods (N = 1,532), we draw on the Ideal Standards Model and theories of communal motivation to examine whether unmet sexual ideals are associated with lower sexual satisfaction and relationship quality and test whether higher sexual communal strength—the motivation to meet a partner's sexual needs—buffered these effects. Across studies, when individuals perceived their partner to fall short in meeting their sexual ideals, they reported poorer sexual and relationship quality. People with partners low in sexual communal strength reported poorer sexual satisfaction and relationship quality when their sexual ideals were unmet, but these associations were attenuated among people with partners who were high in sexual communal strength. Perceived partner responsiveness—both in general (Study 2) and to a partner’s sexual needs specifically (Study 3)—was one reason why people with partners high in sexual communal strength were buffered against the lower sexual and relational quality associated with unmet ideals. Please note this manuscript has received provisional acceptance in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

scholarly journals Partners’ Relationship Mindfulness Promotes Better Daily Relationship Behaviours for Insecurely Attached Individuals

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (19) ◽  
pp. 7267
Author(s):  
Taranah Gazder ◽  
Sarah C. E. Stanton
Keyword(s):  
Positive Relationship ◽  
Attachment Security ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Insecure Attachment ◽  
Attachment Avoidance ◽  
Daily Experience ◽  
Security Enhancement ◽  
Relationship Processes ◽  
A Current ◽  
Over Time

Attachment anxiety and avoidance are generally associated with detrimental relationship processes, including more negative and fewer positive relationship behaviours. However, recent theoretical and empirical evidence has shown that positive factors can buffer insecure attachment. We hypothesised that relationship mindfulness (RM)—open or receptive attention to and awareness of what is taking place internally and externally in a current relationship—may promote better day-to-day behaviour for both anxious and avoidant individuals, as mindfulness improves awareness of automatic responses, emotion regulation, and empathy. In a dyadic daily experience study, we found that, while an individual’s own daily RM did not buffer the effects of their own insecure attachment on same-day relationship behaviours, their partner’s daily RM did, particularly for attachment avoidance. Our findings for next-day relationship behaviours, on the other hand, showed that lower (vs. higher) prior-day RM was associated with higher positive partner behaviours on the following day for avoidant individuals and those with anxious partners, showing this may be an attempt to “make up” for the previous day. These findings support the Attachment Security Enhancement Model and have implications for examining different forms of mindfulness over time and for mindfulness training.

Testing the Incremental Value of a Separate Measure for Secure Attachment Relative to a Measure for Attachment Anxiety and Avoidance

2017 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katrijn Brenning ◽  
Bart Soenens ◽  
Caroline Braet
Keyword(s):  
Early Adolescence ◽  
Middle Childhood ◽  
Attachment Security ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Secure Attachment ◽  
Avoidant Attachment ◽  
Child Attachment ◽  
Incremental Value ◽  
Parent Child

Abstract. Research on attachment in middle childhood and early adolescence has typically relied on either unidimensional measures of attachment security (vs. insecurity) or on differentiated measures of attachment anxiety and avoidance. This study addressed the question whether there is a need to add an explicit measure of security when operationalizing parent-child attachment in terms of anxiety and avoidance. Both dimensional (i.e., regression analyses) and person-centered analyses (i.e., cluster analysis) are used in this study (N = 276, 53% boys, mean age = 10.66) to examine the incremental value of a scale for attachment security (in this study, the Security Scale) in addition to a scale for attachment anxiety and avoidance (in this study, the Experiences in Close Relationships Scale-Revised – Child version; ECR-RC). The present results suggest that an assessment of anxious and avoidant attachment (using the ECR-RC) may suffice to capture the quality of parent-child attachment in middle childhood and early adolescence.

Parental attachment anxiety: Associations with allostatic load in mothers of 1-year-olds

2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 717-737
Author(s):  
Kharah M. Ross ◽  
Heidi S. Kane ◽  
Christine Guardino ◽  
Christine Dunkel Schetter
Keyword(s):  
Maternal Health ◽  
Attachment Style ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Allostatic Load ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
The Body ◽  
Maternal Perceptions ◽  
Perceived Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Partner Responsiveness ◽  
Father Attachment

Growing evidence indicates that individual differences in attachment style are related to health outcomes. The present study extends this literature by examining whether attachment anxiety in both mothers and fathers predicts maternal health the year following the birth of a child in a sample of 698 low-income, racially diverse couples. We hypothesized that maternal perceptions of partner responsiveness would mediate these associations. Maternal allostatic load, a measure of cumulative wear-and-tear on the body due to stress, was used as an indicator of maternal health. Maternal biomarkers (blood pressure, adiposity, blood metabolites, inflammation, and diurnal cortisol) were scored using clinical or top-quartile cutoffs to compute an allostatic load index. Attachment anxiety and perceived partner responsiveness were assessed in interviews. Path models were used to test indirect associations between mother and father attachment anxiety and maternal allostatic load through perceived partner responsiveness. We found that higher mother and father attachment anxiety were each independently and indirectly associated with higher maternal allostatic load through lower maternal perceptions of partner responsiveness. These findings highlight the need to consider both relationship and partner factors in understanding maternal health.

Gender Differences in Attitudinal Acceptance of Intimate Partner Violence Perpetration Under Attachment-Relevant Contexts

2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 229-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine E. Valdez ◽  
Michelle M. Lilly ◽  
David A. Sandberg
Keyword(s):  
Intimate Partner Violence ◽  
Romantic Relationships ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
Partner Violence ◽  
Physical Violence ◽  
Intimate Partner ◽  
Attachment Anxiety ◽  
Attachment Avoidance ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Intimate Partner Violence Perpetration

Attachment theory has been one of the leading theoretical frameworks in the last few decades for explaining physical violence within romantic relationships. In this study, the authors examined differences in attachment patterns and attitudinal acceptance of violence perpetrated in romantic relationships among men and women. The Attitudinal Acceptance of Intimate Partner Violence questionnaire was developed to measure acceptance of intimate partner violence (IPV) under attachment-relevant contexts of abandonment, as well as other contexts identified in the literature. Results indicated that men with higher degrees of attachment anxiety were more accepting of both maleand female-perpetrated IPV under contexts of abandonment, and men with higher degrees of attachment avoidance were more accepting of female-perpetrated IPV under contexts of abandonment. Implications for research and treatment are discussed.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document