What Is Your Attachment Style

Scientific American Mind

January/February 2011

Get Attached

Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find-and Keep-Love by Levine & Heller

Attachment theory designates three main styles in which individuals perceive and respond to intimacy in romantic relationships, which parallel those found in children.

Attachment is an integral part of human behavior throughout their entire life span.

Adults can be divided into attachment categories according ot the way they recall their relationship with their caregivers, which in turn influences their parental behavior.

Patterns of Attachment

Anxious

Avoident

Secure

Basically, secure people find it easy to get close to others, feel comfortable with intimacy and are usually warm and loving.

Anxious people crave intimacy, are often preoccupied with their relationships and tend to worry about their partner's ability to love them back or to stay with them.

Avoidant people equate intimacy with a loss of independence and constantly try to minimize closeness.

Attachment principles teach us that most people are only as needy as their unmet needs.

When their emotional needs are met, they usually turn their attention outward.

This result is sometimes referred to as the "dependency paradox", the more effectively dependent people are on one another, the more independent and creative they become.

Unfortunaltely the significance of adult attachment goes unappreciated. Among adults, the prevailing notion is still that too much dependence in a relationship is a bad thing.

The opposite is true. Our ability to step into the world on our own often stems from the knowledge that there is someone beside us on whom we can rely.

If you want to take the road to independence and happiness, first find the right person to depend on and then travel down it together.

How can you tell what attachment style a person has?

Does the other person show a sincere wish to understand your needs and put your well-being first?

Do they brush aside your concerns or make you feel inadequate, foolish or self-indulgent?

Do you spell out your needs so it is easy for your partner to meet them?

Do you make your partner guess whether something is wrong and then make them guess what that something is?

Begin by determining your own and your partners attachment style to find more security in your relationship.

Take the ATTACHMENT STYLE QUIZ

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