Attachment Styles Explained: A Guide To Understanding Your Relationships
More often I am hearing people in my life and on social media talk about different attachment styles. Attachment theory, initially developed by psychologist John Bowlby, offers a framework to understand how early relationships with caregivers influence our behaviors, emotions, and relationships throughout life. The way we form attachments—whether secure, anxious, avoidant, or disorganized—shapes how we connect with others throughout our lives.
In this blog post, I’ll break down each of the four attachment styles, including how they develop and how they may show up in adult relationships. By beginning to understand your own attachment style, you can gain insight into your own patterns and begin to work towards forming healthier connections with others.
The Four Attachment Styles
Secure Attachment
A secure attachment style is often characterized by trust and emotional availability. People with secure attachment are comfortable experiencing intimacy and vulnerability with others, are generally trusting of others, and are able to communicate their feelings and needs with others.
Growing up, a person with this attachment style likely had positive, supportive, and comforting experiences with their primary caregivers. Primary caregivers likely consistently met their physical and emotional needs consistently, developing feelings of trust and security. Therefore, people with a secure attachment style learned early in their lives that they could lean on others for support. Additionally, this secure attachment helped to foster feelings of confidence and high self-esteem within one’s self.
Anxious Attachment
People with an anxious attachment style may be seen by others as “clingy” or “needy.” They are often worried that their loved ones will leave or abandon them. The idea of being alone can lead to intense anxiety. To help combat this worry, they may seek consistent reassurance from a partner or friend and be hyper-aware of any threats to their relationships. Someone with an anxious attachment style will often view themselves as less worthy of love or view themselves in a negative light and therefore worry that others are not as invested in them as they are in their relationships.
As a young child, caregivers may have been inconsistent in meeting their needs. Because of this, someone with an anxious attachment style learned that their caregivers were unreliable and would not always provide comfort, attention, or support. This inconsistency growing up may have led to feelings of insecurity and anxiety that continue into adulthood relationships.
Avoidant Attachment
People with an avoidant attachment style are often seen as independent and a “lone wolf.” They will often avoid intimacy and may suppress or hide their emotions from others. People with this attachment style often believe that others will disappoint them. Therefore, they do not want to depend on anyone else. Being vulnerable with others may feel like a risk due to the lack of trust that others will care for their emotional needs.
Avoidant attachment often stems from young children not receiving emotional support from their caregivers. Although some of their physical needs may have been met, emotional comfort and safety needs were not met by their caregivers. Therefore, the child learns that they cannot rely on others to meet their emotional needs, which may extend into adult relationships.
Disorganized Attachment
Disorganized attachment is characterized by shifting between characteristics of avoidant and anxious attachment styles depending on the situation. Although a person with a disorganized attachment style may want closeness and intimacy with others, the idea of intimacy also serves as a source of fear and anxiety due to difficulties trusting and depending on others. Difficulty identifying and regulating their emotions may also be common for people with disorganized attachment.
Growing up, a person with a disorganized attachment style likely experienced fear in relation to their caregiver(s). Sometimes these early relationships with caregivers are characterized by trauma or abuse. Caregivers may have also been inconsistent and unpredictable in their behaviors, leading to uncertainty and fear for the child growing up and ultimately learning that they cannot rely on their caregivers to provide for their physical or emotional needs. These feelings of mistrust and fear may then continue into adulthood.
Why Understanding Your Attachment Style Can Be Helpful
As you read about the different attachment styles, consider your own relationships throughout your life. Think about your relationships with caregivers growing up and now, as well as other important relationships, such as romantic relationships, in your life. As you reflect on these relationships, you may notice certain qualities that align with some of the descriptions of attachment styles above. Learning more about your attachment style can help you understand how you relate with others. Gaining this understanding can help you to ultimately discover and develop new ways of connecting with others in your life to form healthier relationships. If you are interested in working with me to learn more about your attachment style and your relationships with others, you can contact me at carolyn@carolynmeillerphd.com or request an appointment here.
About The Author
Dr. Carolyn Meiller is a trauma therapist in Lexington, Kentucky. She specializes in working with adults who are wanting to shift how they relate to others in their lives through being more vulnerable, more authentic, and creating stronger healthier relationships with others. In her work with clients, she frequently discusses attachment styles and works with clients to help them understand where their attachment styles stem from and how those styles are showing up in their adult relationships.
