Adolescence and attachment in Asia Minor

In recent years attachment theory has become one of the main ways in which psychologists think about people and their development through childhood and adolescence into adulthood, their problems and their relationships with other people. Attachment theory all hinges on the relationship between a child and its primary caregiver - usually their mother. People with secure attachment expect others to be accepting and responsive and are comfortable with intimacy and autonomy. People with preoccupied attachment are thought to have had inconsistent support, low sensitivity, high proximity and compulsive caregiving during their childhood and, as a result, have developed a style of relating to people in which they become excessively vigilant, very anxious and ambivalent. People who experienced a fearful attachment style have both a desire for closeness as well as a need for space and independence. They desire social contact but this desire is inhibited by fear of rejection. Finally, people with dismissing attachment have had an inconsistent and unsupportive relationship with their parents and have a negative view of themselves and others. They tend not to trust others and are more self-sufficient and cynical, are poor communicators and are independent. Researchers from Ege University in Turkey studied the effect of different attachment styles on 384 children aged between 11 and 16. The children filled out questionnaires to assess their attachment style and their development. The children with a secure attachment style had higher levels of good behaviour, less emotional symptoms, less hyperactivity and better relationships with their peers. A fearful attachment style was associated with more emotional symptoms and greater difficulties overall. A dismissing attachment style was significantly associated with more emotional symptoms, hyperactivity, lower levels of good behaviour and more problems overall.

Keskin, G. and Cam, O. - Adolescents' strengths and difficulties: approach to attachment styles Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing June 2010, 17(5), 433-441

Mothers, attachment and insecurity

Attachment theory stresses the importance of the bonds a child forms with its mother during infancy - something seen as increasingly important by psychologists. Jude Cassidy from the University of Maryland traced 26 adults in Pittsburgh whose mothers had taken part in a study 40 years earlier. The mothers were asked to rate their one-month old babies on factors such as crying, spitting, sleeping, feeding and predictability and then do the same for the 'average baby.' Twelve of the participants had been rated more negatively than the average baby by their mothers and three quarters of them were classified as 'insecurely attached' in adulthood after being interviewed by the researchers. Of the 14 babies who had been positively perceived by their mothers only two were classified as 'insecurely attached.' Insecure attachment can lead to ongoing problems forming healthy emotional attachments to other people.

You can find out more about this research at

http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/03/thirty-years-on-babies-judged.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BpsResearchDigest+%28BPS+Research+Digest%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Attachment, prenatal stress and cognitive development

Babies whose mothers were stressed when they were pregnant could end up with worse cognitive development than their peers. But any effects on cognitive development can be almost completely overcome by good parenting. A study led by Professor Thomas O'Connor from the University of Rochester Medical Centre measured the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in 125 women as they underwent amniocentesis. When the children were 17 months old the researchers assessed the baby's cognitive development using puzzles, pretend play and memory tests. They also gauged the quality of the relationship between the mothers and their babies using a test in which children are briefly left alone and then reunited with their mothers. The study found that for children with an 'insecure' attachment to their mothers a high prenatal cortisol level was linked to shorter attention spans and weaker language and problem-solving skills. However, there was no link between prenatal cortisol levels and cognitive development in children who had a secure relationship with their mother.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100225140906.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Attachment style and bipolar disorder

Attachment style can be defined as the way in which we carry our relationship with our closest childhood caregiver (usually our mother) into our own adult relationships. Attachment style can be described as secure - characterised by comfort with intimacy and autonomy and with a positive model of oneself and the other in a relationship - or insecure. Insecure attachment can be further divided into three types: anxious in which people are fearful on intimacy and socially avoidant, preoccupied with relationships in which people have a negative model of the self and a postiive model of the other, and dismissing in which the subject has a positive model of the self but is dismissive of the value of intimacy. Researchers from the universities of Nottingham, Liverpool, Lancaster and Bangor looked into attachment style in people with bipolar disorder. They studied 148 people, 107 of whom had the condition. They found that 78% of the bipolar patients had an insecure attachment style compared to only 32% of those unaffected. Healthy people had higher secure attachment, lower anxious attachment and lower preoccupied attachment. Mania was associated with higher secure and preoccupied attachment styles and depression was associated with higher preoccupied and lower dismissing attachment style scores.

Morriss, Richard K. ... [et al] - Adult attachment in bipolar 1 disorder Psychology and Psychotherapy: theory, research and practice September 2009, 82(3), 267-277

Why ignoring the pecking order is better than trying to get to the top of it

People who feel insecure and unsafe in their personal relationships can feel under pressure to try and avoid feelings of inferiority associated with being overlooked or rejected. In contrast people who feel more secure do not fear inferiority or mistakes as they see people as essentially accepting and helpful rather than rejecting and shaming. Researchers have developed a scale to measure these feelings which ranges from insecure striving - where people feel they must compete for their social place and avoid mistakes and inferiority - at one end to non-secure striving at the other. Researchers from the University of Derby studied 62 people diagnosed with depression and measured their:

• striving to avoid inferiority
• fears of missing out, being overlooked and active rejection
• attachment style (the way in which people form relationships which is thought to stem from our very early relationships with our mother our 'primary caregiver')
• perception of their social rank
• and mental-health problems

Striving to avoid inferiority was highly correlated with shame and moderately associated with feeling inferior to others and submissive behaviour. It was also associated with anxious and avoidant attachment, self-harm, anxiety, depression and stress. The researchers concluded that when people feel insecure in their social environments it can lead them to focus too much on a heirarchical view of themselves and others with a fear of rejection if they feel they have been too inferior or subordinate; something which may increase their vulnerability to depression, anxiety and stress.

Gilbert, Paul ... [et al] - The dark side of competition: how competitive behaviour and striving to avoid inferiority are linked to depression, anxiety, stress and self-harm Psychology and Psychotherapy: theory, research and practice June 2009, 82(2), 123-136

Attachment and personality disorders

Attachment styles are patterns of expectations, needs, ways of regulating one's moods and social behaviour. They are believed to stem from our relationship with our primary caregiver - usually our mother - during our first few years of life. A sensitive and consistent response to a child leads to positive models of oneself and others developing but inadequate responsiveness leads to either a negative model of oneself as undeserving of support, or others as fundamentally unreliable. People with negative models of themselves are said to suffer from attachment anxiety. They are hypersensitive to things going wrong in relationships, constantly monitor the situation for signs of abandonment and can be 'clingy.' People with negative models of others downplay the importance of relationships and try not to think about them too much - something psychologists term attachment avoidance. Researchers from New York looked at the links between attachment style and interpersonal problems in a sample of 41 people receiving outpatient treatment for a mental-health problem. They found that people with secure attachment were less likely to be dominant, vindictive, cold, socially-inhibited and non-assertive. People with attachment anxiety were more likely to be cold, vindictive, socially-inhibited and dominant, although they were also more likely to be self-sacrificing. People with attachment avoidance were more likely to be dominant.

Haggerty, Greg, Hilsenroth, Mark J. and Vala-Stewart, Rosemarie - Attachment and interpersonal distress: examining the relationship between attachment styles and interpersonal problems in a clinical population Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy January-February 2009, 16(1), 1-9