Relationships and Adult Attachment Styles.

This blog is the third in a series of four exploring attachment patterns and styles.  Attachment – that sense of feeling connected to another – plays an important role in our relationships.  Feeling attached, included and connected in relationship to supportive others is something that makes life wonderful.  And the reverse is also the case:  to feel excluded, isolated, lonely, and disconnected is an agonising experience – one that flies directly in the face of our “need to belong”[1].   This explains why being stonewalled is so painful. 

In our first blog in this series, we explored the origins of what is now known as Attachment Theory – and how such theory emerged from studying how young children responded in relationships when hurt, separated or when they felt under threat.    In the second blog, we looked at the four categories of attachment patterns in children.  In this blog, we’ll consider attachment styles and patterns in adulthood and how our adult attachment styles can play out in romantic, friend and family relationships.   Recognising the patterns that tend to play out for us in our adult relationships can be a helpful step towards more fulfilling connections.     As  with our previous blogs, exploring attachment styles can throw up difficult feelings and painful memories.  If you do read on, please take your time, and take care of yourself.    Aim to be attentive to what you feel and need as you reflect on the different adult attachment styles. 

Adult attachment patterns

Just as there are four widely accepted categories for childhood attachment patterns, the work of American Psychologist, Mary Main, in the 1990s has resulted in the categorisation of four adult attachment patterns.  These have similarities to the childhood attachment patterns but have slightly different names. 

The four adult attachment patterns are:

• Secure

• Avoidant

• Anxious

• Fearful 

One way of thinking about the adult attachment patterns[2] is to consider attachments patterns as continuums that focus on:

• To what extent you avoid others? 

• To what extent you feel anxious?

• To what extent you hold a positive view of yourself?

• To what extent you hold a positive view of others? 

As we’ll see, each of the adult attachment styles has a typical response to each of these four questions. 

So, let’s find out more about the four adult attachment styles, to help you with considering your own attachment patterns in your romantic, friendship and family relationships.  We’ll start with the three forms of non-secure attachment before turning our attention to secure attachment.  And – spoiler alert…. the good news is, that it is possible – no matter what type of attachment pattern we currently have, to also change our attachment styles.  Your brain’s capacity for adaption, growth and change (known as neuroplasticity) means that you can move towards a secure attachment style. 

Avoidant adult attachment

Sometimes known as a dismissing style of attachment, this pattern is common in adults who demonstrated an avoidant pattern as a child.  If you’re someone who leans towards an avoidant adult attachment pattern, you may notice that you can be extremely self-sufficient.  Perhaps others have commented you seem invulnerable, frosty or even defensive in close relationships.  You may find it difficult to let your guard down and trust others.  Whilst you may have a positive view of yourself, past experience has led you to generally have a negative view of others – you’ll certainly want to see the evidence someone is worth opening up to before you make yourself vulnerable to them.  You don’t feel overly anxious – you tend to keep yourself to yourself and avoid others.

Anxious adult attachment

Sometimes described as anxious-preoccupied, this adult attachment style is common in in adults who demonstrated an insecure ambivalent / resistant pattern as a child.  If you’re someone who leans towards an anxious adult attachment pattern, you may notice that you can be emotionally expressive.  One fear that quickly surfaces in relationships is an anxiety that you will be rejected.  This anxiety plays out as a need to check and gain reassurance, which can push people away at times.  You may have been given the labels of “needy”, “clingy” or “high maintenance” in the past, and that can – of course – be extremely hurtful, particularly as you may already regard yourself as unlovable or flawed in some way.  You hold a positive view of others but a negative view of yourself and this prompts you to move towards others to seek that reassurance to help quell the sense of anxiety you can feel about relationships.   It may be hard for you to trust your instincts in relation to signals others give you in relationships – your antennae are likely to be highly trained to assume that others dislike you or are less committed to the relationship that you want them to be. 

Fearful adult attachment

This pattern is common in adults who demonstrated a disorganised pattern as a child.  If you are someone who leans towards a fearful adult attachment pattern, you may notice that you have difficulty regulating your emotions.   You may know that you have experienced trauma or loss in your lifetime that remains unprocessed or unresolved.  This can get in the way of being able to connect with others.  And, sadly, you may notice you have a negative view of others – expecting they will let you down, or be out to get you in some way.  You also may hold a negative view of yourself, too, and struggle with your own self-esteem and self-worth.  As such, you avoid others and feel a great deal of anxiety about relationships.   

Secure adult attachment

A secure adult attachment pattern often is based on a foundation of a secure attachment style in childhood.  If you’re someone who leans toward a secure adult attachment pattern, you may find you have low levels of anxiety when interacting with others and can build and maintain stable relationships with people the majority of the time.   You feel at ease and able to navigate challenges in your friendships and romantic relationships.  With both a positive model of self and a positive view of others, you are likely to find you can usually move towards people without feeling a pull towards avoidance.  You manage the peaks and troughs of relationship challenges with a sense of resilience and trust yourself to find ways to communicate your needs and wants in relationships.

Earned secure attachment

When we’re considering secure adult attachment, it is important to also give attention to something that’s been given the label earned secure attachment.  Earned secure attachment refers to an adult attachment style and pattern with the hallmarks of secure attachment.  Yet, they’ve earned that secure attachment after doing the hard work of personal development to address the ways that past relationships, including childhood relationships, have impacted them.   Through their own efforts and in connection with supportive others, a person can move from one of the three insecure attachment styles to a more non-defensive, open and satisfying attachment pattern as an adult – one where they feel good about themselves, and about others in their life and are able to trust others and themselves as a result.  You may recognise that you have some or even many relationships in your life where you feel you have a sense of earned secure attachment?  And, if not, it is possible to move towards this.  Finding practical ways to finding freedom from insecure attachment patterns and moving towards earned secure attachment will be the focus of our final blog in this series.

. 

Exploring your adult attachment style

As with the childhood attachment styles, when reflecting on your own adult attachment style, you are unlikely to find that your lived experience is neat fit for one of the textbook categories.  You may find that you feel differently in different relationships – that some relationships bring out an increased sense of anxiety, or a decreased sense of self-worth.  Other relationships seem to support you to move towards others, holding both the other person and yourself in high regard.   It can be helpful to hold the adult attachment patterns loosely and explore which might be a “best-fit”, recognising the scope for movement and change.  Attachment theory is just that – a theory, and its important to not get too hung up on finding the “right” category.  These questions can help you in the exploration, and can also be prompts to help you explore your attachment style in counselling or with the support of a therapist. 

• To what extent do you fixate on signs that the other person dislikes you?

• How easy do you find it to open up to others?

• Do you ask your romantic partner(s) for reassurance often?

• To what extent do you feel comfortable spending time alone from people you are in relationships with?

• Do you feel you can rely on other people in life, generally?

• When you have a disagreement with a friend, family member or partner, how do you feel afterwards? 

Taking care of yourself

So, as with all the blogs in this series, we’ve emphasised the importance of taking care of yourself as you consider and reflect upon how attachment styles impact you – both with your present relationships, and with past relationships too.  Reflecting of attachment patterns can be challenging and difficult, particularly, if we know we’ve experienced relationships which have contributed to feeling insecure.  That’s why many people choose to access the support of a counsellor or a psychotherapist as they explore their own attachment patterns.  There are other ways to care for yourself, besides counselling.  Finding ways that work for you to take care of yourself as you reflect on your attachment history and present is an important part of that journey.  

References:

[1] Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1995). The need to belong: Desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation. Psychological Bulletin, 117(3), 497–529

[2] Bartholomew, K., & Horowitz, L.M. (1991). Attachment Styles Among Young Adults: A Test of a Four-Category Model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61(2), 226–244.