The Relationship Between Adult Attachment and Trauma (original) (raw)
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The effects of experienced childhood maternal abuse on adult attachment styles
2007
The relationship between experienced maternal abuse and the development of an insecure attachment style was examined. Data was collected via selfreport questionnaires in a large, urban college campus. The questionnaires used were the Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS-2, Straus, Hamby, Boney-McCoy, & Sugarman, 1996) and Attachment Questionnaire (AQ, Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991). The sample included 81 females and 86 males, ranging in age from 18-57 years old. No significant correlation was found between the experience of maternal abuse and the development of a fearful attachment style. The results did support a significant correlation between maternal abuse and the development of an insecure-dismissive attachment style. Future research is needed with more diverse samples that consist of more variability in abuse.
Mapping the road from childhood trauma to adult somatization: the role of attachment
Psychosomatic medicine
This study tested whether insecure attachment mediates the link between childhood trauma and adult somatization. A community sample of 101 couples completed self-report measures, including the Relationship Scales Questionnaire, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, the Somatic Symptom Inventory, the Beck Depression Inventory, and the Conflict Tactics Scale. Childhood trauma was associated with higher levels of somatization and insecure attachment. Insecure attachment style was also associated with higher levels of somatization. Controlling for age, income, and recent intimate partner violence, analyses showed that fearful attachment fully mediated the link between childhood trauma and somatization for women. For men, there was no such mediation, but both childhood trauma and insecure attachment styles made independent contributions to predicting levels of somatization. Findings are consistent with the hypothesis that, for women, childhood trauma influences adult levels of somatization...
Child Abuse & Neglect, 2016
Previous research has demonstrated a positive association between child maltreatment and adult interpersonal trauma (Arata, 2000; Crawford & Wright, 2007). From a betrayal trauma theory perspective, evidence suggests that the experience of trauma high in betrayal (e.g., child maltreatment by parents or guardians) increases ones risk of betrayal trauma as an adult (Gobin & Freyd, 2009). However, the mechanisms explaining these associations are not well understood; attachment theory could provide further insight. Child maltreatment is associated with insecure attachment (Baer & Martinez, 2006; Muller et al., 2000). Insecure attachment is also associated with deficits in interpersonal functioning and risk for intimate partner violence, suggesting insecure attachment may mediate the relationship between child maltreatment and the experience of betrayal trauma as an adult. The current study tested this hypothesis in a sample of 601 college students. Participants completed online questionnaires including the Child Abuse and Trauma Scale (CATS), the Experiences in Close Relationships-Revised (ECR-R) and the Brief Betrayal Trauma Survey (BBTS). Results indicated that child maltreatment is associated with adult betrayal trauma and anxious attachment partially mediates this relationship.
Development and Psychopathology, 2020
Waters, Ruiz, and Roisman (2017) recently published evidence based on the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (MLSRA) that sensitive caregiving during childhood is associated with higher levels of secure base script knowledge during the Adult Attachment Interview (AAIsbs). At present, however, little is known about the role of variation in atypical caregiving, including abuse and/or neglect, in explaining individual differences in AAIsbs. This study revisited data from the MLSRA (N = 157) to examine the association between experiencing abuse and/or neglect in the first 17.5 years of life and secure base script knowledge measured at ages 19 and 26 years. Several aspects of abuse and/or neglect experiences were assessed, including perpetrator identity, timing, and type. Regressions revealed that childhood abuse and/or neglect was robustly associated with lower AAIsbs scores in young adulthood, above and beyond previously documented associations with maternal sensitivit...
Childhood Emotional Abuse and Attachment Processes in the Dyadic Adjustment of Dating Couples
In an effort to improve understanding of the mechanisms that link early maltreatment to later outcomes, this study investigated the mediation effects of adult attachment processes on the association between childhood emotional abuse and later romantic relationships among heterosexual couples. College students and their dating partners (N 310; 155 couples) completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire , Experiences in Close Relationship Scale, and Dyadic Adjustment Scale. Using the Actor–Partner Interdependence Model (Kenny, Kashy, & Cook, 2006), multilevel modeling results indicated that memories of childhood emotional abuse reported by both students and their partners were significantly associated with attachment strategies, as well as romantic relationship quality. Findings supported hypothesized mediation effects of attachment anxiety and avoidance.
Development and psychopathology, 2017
The present report used data from the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation to investigate the factor structure and childhood abuse and/or neglect related antecedents of adults' attachment states of mind in a high-risk sample. Adult Attachment Interviews (AAIs) were collected when participants were age 26 years (N = 164) and Current Relationship Interviews (CRIs) were collected from participants (N = 116) and their romantic partners when target participants were between ages 20 and 28 years (M = 25.3 years). For both the AAI and the CRI, exploratory factor analyses revealed that (a) attachment state of mind scales loaded on two weakly correlated dimensions reflecting dismissing and preoccupied states of mind and (b) ratings of unresolved discourse loaded on the same factor as indicators of preoccupied states of mind. Experiencing any subtype of abuse and/or neglect, especially during multiple developmental periods, and experiencing multiple subtypes of abuse and/or...
Attachment & Human Development, 2006
This study provides data supporting the reliability and validity of an Italian version of the adult attachment script representation task, designed by Waters & . Specifically, we tested hypotheses concerning positive relations between attachment scriptedness scores and two other representational measures, derived from the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). In addition, we tested the hypothesis that secure base script scores should predict maternal sensitivity in the context of motherinfant interaction. Thirty-one mothers completed narrative protocols and received scriptedness scores using the Waters & criteria. Prior to the attachment script assessment, mothers had been assessed using the AAI and had been observed in the context of infant -mother interactions to assess maternal sensitivity. Assessment of instrument reliability was satisfactory (Cronbach's a 4.70) and both hypotheses were supported; the attachment scriptedness score (based on 4 attachment narratives) was positively and significantly associated with the AAI coherence score, the continuous security score derived from the AAI State of Mind scales, and with maternal sensitivity. These data extend to another socio-cultural milieu, previous findings supporting reliability, convergent, and predictive validity of the attachment script representation task as a measure of adult attachment. about attachment relevant situations; at a higher level, this experience-near information would be summarized in mental representations concerning the range of responses to be expected from the attachment figure in many attachment relevant contexts. At a more generalized level, internal working models incorporate knowledge about the self and the attachment figure and, ultimately, general expectations in affective relationships and global ideas about the nature of human beings and the world as a more or less reliable place. These representations with respect to attachment reflect the degree of security and confidence within intimate relationships and they accomplish a very important function by providing a personal framework to regulate behavior and expectations both in present relationships and as new ones are constructed .
A study on influence of complex trauma on attachment styles in young adults
IJHS, 2022
Human beings are social animals in a world cemented by a complex network of attachments. Born with tabula-rasa, we are at the mercy of life experiences to shape our worldview. Perception and attention are powerful phenomena that structure the unique world each one of us inhabits. Ironically, we see the world as we are, yet the world we live in reinforces our beliefs, which is akin to living in echo chambers. The present study aimed at studying the influence of complex trauma on attachment styles and consequently attachment behaviours proved fruitful. From the correlational analysis of the data of 101 non-clinical young adult participants, the two variables showed significant correlation. The negative worldview created emotional dysfunction leading to difficulty forming close and dependable relationships. It created room for preoccupation and discomfort.
Rosemary E. Bernstein and Jennifer J. Freyd, 2014
A t its foundation, attachment theory (AT) (Bowlby, 1969) is a theory of developmental psychology that uses evolutionary and ethological frameworks to describe how the caregiver*-child relationship emerges and how it influences subsequent social, emotional, and cognitive development. And while AT emerged out of observations of child-caregiver dynamics, it was quickly and readily generalised to address similar psychosocial phenomena within adult romantic relationships (e.g., Hazan & Shaver, 1987, 1994). Betrayal trauma theory (BTT) (Freyd, 1994, 1996), building on the most central concepts of AT, has focused very specifically on understanding psychological responses to trauma. Like AT, BTT proposes that trauma occurring within the context of an attachment relationship is qualitatively different than trauma that takes place outside of one. Also as with AT, BTT was first developed with the child-caregiver relationship in mind but has since been applied to other adult relationships, including not only romantic relationships but hierarchical relationships (such as that between an employer and an employee, or an institution and its member) as well (e.g., Freyd, 1996; Smith & Freyd, 2013). Regarding the specific circumstance of maltreatment or traumatisation by an attachment figure, both AT and BTT make specific predictions about how humans adaptively respond. The following paper aims to describe where and how these predictions overlap, and where they differ. More specifically, we will argue that the significant theoretical concordances include: 1. A central assumption that humans have evolved a strong motivation to maintain affectional bonds with close others. 2. The rationale that it is adaptive to defensively exclude knowledge of and/or selectively process experiences of maltreatment by a caregiver, as complete ATTACHMENT:
European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 2013
Background: Current psychometric measures of childhood trauma history generally fail to assess the relational-socioecological context within which childhood maltreatment occurs, including the relationship of abusers to abused persons, the emotional availability of caregivers, and the respondent's own thoughts, feelings, and actions in response to maltreatment. Objective: To evaluate a computerized approach to measuring the relational-socioecological context within which childhood maltreatment occurs. Method: The psychometric properties of a Childhood Attachment and Relational Trauma Screen (CARTS) were evaluated as a retrospective survey of childhood maltreatment history designed to be appropriate for completion by adults. Participants were undergraduates (n 0222), an internet sample (n 0123), and psychiatric outpatients (n 030). Results: The internal reliability, convergent, and concurrent validity of the CARTS were supported across samples. Paired differences in means and correlations between rated item-descriptiveness to self, mothers, and fathers also accorded with findings of prior attachment and maltreatment research, illustrating the utility of assessing the occurrence and effects of maltreatment within a relational-socioecological framework. Conclusions: Results preliminarily support a new survey methodology for assessing childhood maltreatment within a relational-socioecological framework. Further psychometric evaluation of the CARTS is warranted.