Unpacking Attachment
Therapist and author Gareth Halliday gives a brief introduction to attachment theory, how it affects us and how we can use it to improve our lives and relationships.
Introducing Attachment Theory
Chances are you might have heard of Attachment Theory, via magazine articles, blogs, tiktok and instagram, it’s made it through to the psychologically-curious mainstream. It’s not unusual to hear clients describing themselves as insecurely attached, or suffering from an attachment wound. But what really is attachment theory and how valuable is it as a tool in helping us to understand ourselves and make changes in our lives?
John Bowlby and the history of attachment
Attachment theory was first developed by the great British psychotherapist John Bowlby. Bowlby’s early work was informed by the second world war, some of his early essays refer to the impact on children and their development during the loss and disruption of the war. Initially he was interested in how to minimise the distress of children who were separate from parents by evacuations from the city or the death of a parent.
Originally trained in a Freudian Psychoanalytical approach, his observations of the reality of life for children led to a frustration at Freud’s focus on the fantasy world. He became more interested in biology and developmental psychology, focusing on the importance of caregiving ‘in the real world’ on children.
This led Bowlby to his core idea that infants form an emotional attachment to a primary caregiver and use this as the secure base from which they then go on to explore their environment, and return to this secure base for nourishment and safety.
The quality of this ‘attachment’, how we relate to our primary caregiver early in life then has a huge influence on how we view the world, how we expect our close relationships to function, what we look for in relationships. In a very real sense, from the perspective of attachment theory we can say that our whole map for the the world, what to expect from our environment and the people in it, is hugely influenced by our early attachment experiences.
Expansion of the theory
Bowlby’s ideas were expanded in the 1970s by American-Canadian psychologist Mary Ainsworth who developed the famous Strange Situation experiment. These experiments monitored how young children responded to being separated from their primary caregiver in an unfamiliar environment.
The four attachment ‘types’
By observing the response of the children Ainsworth developed four different ‘Attachment Types.’
1 - Secure Attachment: ‘I can rely on other people to meet my needs, I deserve to be cared for and the environment will provide for me.’
When a child’s caregivers are consistently responsive to their needs they learn that their distress will be met with care and comfort. It’s safe to explore their environment and the world is broadly predictable and not overwhelming.
How this impacts in adulthood: intimacy and independence will be generally comfortable for the securely attached adult. They can trust, communicate their needs, and have an ability to ‘self-soothe’ or emotionally regulate when under stress.
2 - Anxious / Ambivalent attachment: ‘I’m not sure if you’ll be there for me, I’m not sure if the world is safe.’
If childhood caregiving is inconsistent, sometimes attentive, other times detached or unavailable, an anxious attachment style can develop. The child is unsure what the caregiver’s response will be, they can’t predict it, can’t trust the caregiver and the world to provide for them. As children they might be hyper vigilant about a caregiver’s presence, cling to them, cry and struggle to be comforted even when reunited.
How this impacts in adulthood: Someone with an anxious attachment type might crave closeness and reassurance but fear abandonment and the ‘risk’ of becoming to close to someone. The fear caused by anxiety can make them appear needy or preoccupied. Self soothing and emotional regulation can be difficult, the world can feel like a scary and threatening place.
3 - Avoidant / Dismissive attachment: ‘I can’t rely on anyone else so I have to get by alone.’
When caregivers are consistently emotionally distant or reject the child’s distress and refuse to comfort them, the child learns to repress their emotional needs as they are not attended to anyway, this avoids further rejections.
How this impacts in adulthood: An avoidant attachment style in adulthood can make a person compulsively independent, downplay or undervalue their emotional needs, struggle to feel or acknowledge their feelings.
4 - Disorganised / Fearful attachment: ‘I want to be close, but being close is dangerous and frightening.’
This develops in childhood when a caregiver shifts between being a source of comfort and one of fear, often as a result of trauma and abuse or frighteningly unpredictable behaviour that makes people and the world scary and confusing.
How this impacts in adulthood: The person may struggle to understand relationships and have an accurate understanding of the inner world of others. Craving intimacy but finding it frightening and overwhelming pushing to reject the other.
OK, so now what?
Reading about attachment styles can be helpful in understanding why our personalities function in the way they do and why we can view the world in such different ways from close friends and other family members. But it can also feel a bit depressing, as if our attachment style is determined in childhood and thus our destiny is set.
However this isn’t the case.
Reasons to be positive about attachment
Our attachment style represents a pattern of behaviour, or a ‘map’ of reality that we habitually use in relationships, however it’s not a diagnosis or mindset that's forever ‘fixed’ from childhood. Studies show that our brains retain a neuroplasticity throughout life, which allows us to learn and develop. Recognising which attachment style feels familiar to us is the first stage in being able to change this, and become more secure in our relationships and within ourselves.
Some practical tools for different attachment styles
Secure: Focus on maintaining healthy self-care habits and healthy boundaries in relationships.
Anxious: Practice bodily regulation and self-soothing techniques such as vagal therapy, yoga or box-breathing to calm the anxious feelings. Clearly asking for reassurance can be helpful, giving voice to feelings and doubts, rather than experiencing them internally and ‘acting out’ from them.
Avoidant: Practising small doses of vulnerability and reliance on others, leaning to gradually tolerate more emotional closeness and ‘opening up,’ learning to voice needs rather than assuming they won’t met and ‘shutting down.’
Disorganised: Identifying and recognising mixed-signal, ‘push-pull’ moments of desire for connection mixed with rejection of it. Developing stabilising and grounding techniques such as box-breathing and yoga.
The role of therapy in developing a ‘secure base’ through attachment theory
Therapy can help us explore and understand broadly how attachment in early life has affected how we view relationships and how we view the world around us. It can help to give language for feelings that were once confusing, create some distance from our ‘automatic’ emotional responses.
When we find ourselves repeating past mistakes in friendships, work relationships and romantic attachments, it’s possible that we’re acting out our old attachment wounds. Becoming aware of this means we can begin to make choices about what kind of relationships we want (which are all unique to us as individuals, the four main styles being only rough groupings) and develop a stronger sense of our own ‘secure base’ within ourself, by recognising when we’re responding as if we were still a helpless child, reliant on another person for care, rather than an adult with choices. We can also develop healthy self care and self soothing strategies, that mean ‘triggering’ events and the difficult moments of life, don’t become overwhelming. But are instead challenges that we can overcome.
In conclusion
Attachment theory is a fascinating and helpful model for understanding why we behave in the ways we do and how our early life experience and emotional bonds have influenced the ways we view the world and the people in it. It’s key to remember though that everyone is a unique individual. An ‘attachment style’ is just a guide or an indicator that we can use as the basis of our development to move towards the kind of relationships and the life that we want to lead.
Useful resources on Attachment: