Unresolved loss in the Adult Attachment Interview: Implications for marital and parenting relationships

2008 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 717-735 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy L. Busch ◽  
Philip A. Cowan ◽  
Carolyn P. Cowan
Keyword(s):  
Preschool Children ◽  
Family Functioning ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Positive Emotion ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Authoritarian Parenting ◽  
Direct Observations ◽  
Self Reports ◽  
Unresolved Loss

AbstractThis study examined links between the unresolved loss of a significant person and current functioning in marital and parenting relationships. Participants were 80 women who had experienced loss, their husbands, and their preschool children. Unresolved loss was assessed using the Adult Attachment Interview, and individual, marital, and parenting adaptation was assessed through videotaped observations and women's self-reports. As predicted, women with unresolved loss displayed less positive emotion and more anxiety and anger with both their husbands and children, compared to women who were not unresolved. They also displayed less authoritative and more authoritarian parenting styles with their children. Yet unresolved women did not report more individual or relationship difficulties, suggesting that direct observations are needed to assess the implications of unresolved loss for family functioning.

Earned- and continuous-security in adult attachment: Relation to depressive symptomatology and parenting style

1994 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 359-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane L. Pearson ◽  
Deborah A. Cohn ◽  
Philip A. Cowan ◽  
Carolyn Pape Cowan
Keyword(s):  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Depressive Symptomatology ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Model Classification ◽  
Working Models ◽  
Working Model ◽  
Early Experiences ◽  
Earned Security ◽  
Early Relationships

AbstractThe secure working model classification of adult attachment, as derived from Main and Goldwyn's (in press) Adult Attachment Interview scoring system, was considered in terms of earned-security and continuous-security. Earned-security was a classification given to adults who described difficult, early relationships with parents, but who also had current secure working models as indicated by high coherency scores; continuous-security referred to a classification in which individuals described secure early attachment relationship with parents and current secure working models. Working models of attachment were classified as earned-secure, continuous-secure, or insecure in a sample of 40 parents of preschool children. Comparisons among the classifications were conducted on a measure of depressive symptoms and two sets of ratings of observed parenting styles. Adults with earned-secure classifications had comparable depressive symptomatology to insecures, with 30% of the insecures, 40% of the earned-secures, and only 10% of the continuous-secures having scores exceeding the clinical cut-off. The rate of depressive symptomatology in the earned-secure group suggests that reconstructions of past difficulties may remain emotional liabilities despite a current secure working model. With regard to parenting styles with their preschoolers, the behavior of earned-secure parents was comparable to that of the continuous-secures. This refinement in conceptualizing secure working models suggests ways for understanding variation in pathways to competent parenting as well as a possible perspective on how adults' adverse early experiences may continue to place them and their children at risk.

Unresolved loss due to miscarriage: an addition to the Adult Attachment Interview

1999 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-170 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marian J. Bakermans-Kranenburg ◽  
Carlo Schuengel ◽  
Marinus H. Van Ijzendoorn
Keyword(s):  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Unresolved Loss

The Adult Attachment Interview and self-reports of attachment style: An empirical rapprochement.

2007 ◽  
Vol 92 (4) ◽  
pp. 678-697 ◽  
Author(s):  
Glenn I. Roisman ◽  
Ashley Holland ◽  
Keren Fortuna ◽  
R. Chris Fraley ◽  
Eric Clausell ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Attachment Style ◽  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Self Reports

Developmental trauma and unresolved loss in the Adult Attachment Interview

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shoshana Ringel
Keyword(s):  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Traumatic Experience ◽  
Traumatic Loss ◽  
Subsequent Discussion ◽  
Integrative Treatment Model ◽  
Subsequent Loss ◽  
Unresolved Loss ◽  
Early Trauma

This article describes attachment perspectives on unresolved loss and dissociation beginning with Bowlby’s conceptualisation of grief and bereavement, and subsequent discussion of unresolved/traumatic loss on the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). An AAI selected by the author will be utilised to show how traumatic factors in the speaker’s childhood, including sexual abuse and maternal neglect and rejection, may result in an unresolved, complicated grief process. The author intends to illuminate the implications of early trauma and subsequent loss on one’s sense of self and relational life, and to suggest an integrative treatment model that would address early traumatic experience and subsequent bereavement.

scholarly journals PATTERNS OF FAMILY FUNCTIONING AS PREDICTORS OF PARENTING STYLE AMONG THE LEFT-BEHIND FAMILIES OF GULF MIGRANTS

2021 ◽  
pp. 540-547
Author(s):  
Shameer V ◽  
Joseph I. Injodey
Keyword(s):  
Family Functioning ◽  
Parenting Style ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Family Satisfaction ◽  
Circumplex Model ◽  
Authoritarian Parenting ◽  
Left Behind ◽  
Faces Iv ◽  
Authoritative Parenting Style ◽  
Authoritarian Parenting Style

Understanding the family functioning of left-behind families of gulf migrants and how they relate to parenting style is critically important to social workers worldwide. The study examined the associations between family functioning patterns and mothers parenting styles among the left-behind families of gulf migrants. The circumplex model of family functioning put forwarded by David H. Olson served as the study’s theoretical framework. Family Adaptation and Cohesion Evaluation Scale (FACES IV) (Olson, FACES IV and the Circumplex Model: Validation Study, 2011) was used for testing family functioning, and the Parenting Style and Dimension Questionnaire (Robinson, Mandleco, Olson, & Hart, 2001) was used for testing the parenting style and its dimensions. The study’s main findings suggest that balanced cohesion and flexibility correlate with the authoritative parenting style. It also revealed that the authoritarian parenting style correlates negatively with all the functional family functioning patterns: balanced cohesion and flexibility. Authoritarian parenting style correlates positively with all the dysfunctional patterns of family functioning also. While, permissive parenting style correlates positively only with balanced cohesion, disengaged, enmeshed, family communication, and family satisfaction dimension of family functioning. This benchmark study offers family social work practitioners information to assist families and contribute to family social policies. KEYWORDS: family functioning, parenting style, left-behind families.

scholarly journals Psychophysiological responses underlying unresolved loss and trauma in the Adult Attachment Interview

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Lianne Bakkum ◽  
Mirjam Oosterman ◽  
Marije L. Verhage ◽  
Florentina C. Kunseler ◽  
R. M. Pasco Fearon ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Skin Conductance Level ◽  
Multilevel Modelling ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Sinus Arrhythmia ◽  
Unresolved Loss ◽  
First Time

Abstract Unresolved loss/trauma in the context of the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) has been theorised to result from dissociative processing of fear-related memories and ideas. To examine the plausibility of this model, this study tested hypothesised associations between unresolved loss/trauma and indicators of autonomic nervous system (ANS) reactivity. First-time pregnant women (N = 235) participated in the AAI while heart rate (interbeat interval; IBI) and indicators of parasympathetic reactivity (respiratory sinus arrhythmia; RSA) and sympathetic reactivity (pre-ejection period; PEP, skin conductance level; SCL) were recorded. Using multilevel modelling, ANS reactivity was examined in relation to topic (loss/trauma versus other questions); discussion of actual loss/trauma; classification of unresolved/disorganised; and unresolved responses during the interview. Responses to loss/trauma questions and discussion of loss were associated with respectively larger and smaller IBIs. There was no moderation by unresolved/disorganised status. Unresolved responses about loss were associated with smaller IBIs. Participants classified as unresolved/disorganised showed decreasing PEP and blunted SCL throughout the whole interview. The findings suggest that unresolved speech about loss co-occurs with physiological arousal, although the inconclusive findings regarding parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system responses fail to clearly support the role of fear.

Mothers' and fathers' working models of childhood attachment relationships, parenting styles, and child behavior

1992 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 417-431 ◽  
Author(s):  
Deborah A. Cohn ◽  
Philip A. Cowan ◽  
Carolyn P. Cowan ◽  
Jane Pearson
Keyword(s):  
Risk Factor ◽  
Child Behavior ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Adult Attachment ◽  
Adult Attachment Interview ◽  
Parent Child Relations ◽  
Mothers And Fathers ◽  
Working Models ◽  
Working Model ◽  
Childhood Attachment

AbstractThis study addresses the question of whether or not parents' working models of childhood attachments constitute a risk factor for difficulties in current parent-child relations. In a sample of 27 families and their preschool-aged children, mother-child and father-child dyads were observed in separate laboratory play sessions from which ratings of parents' and children's behavior were collected. Working models of attachment were assessed using the Adult Attachment Interview (George, Kaplan, & Main, 1984). Results showed that parents classified as insecure were less warm and provided less structure in interactions with their children than did parents classified as secure. Children of insecure parents were less warm toward their parents than were children of secure parents. Analyses of parents' joint attachment classification showed that insecure women married to insecure men were less warm and provided less structure with their children than did mothers in either the insecure-secure or secure-secure dyads. These findings suggest that, in two-parent families, an insecure working model may be a risk factor for less competent parenting but that the risk is more pronounced when both parents have insecure working models of attachment.

scholarly journals The Relationship between Parenting Styles and Behavioral Problems among Bahraini Preschoolers

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 58-78
Author(s):  
Amina Al- Hajeri
Keyword(s):  
Preschool Children ◽  
Young Children ◽  
Parenting Style ◽  
Parenting Styles ◽  
Behavioral Problems ◽  
Attention Deficit ◽  
Authoritarian Parenting ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Authoritarian Parenting Style

The aim of the present study was to explore the relationship between Bahrainis’ mothers parenting styles and their young children behavioral problems. The sample composed of 255 mothers and 255 teachers of preschool children. Mothers responded to the Parenting Style Instrument whereas the teachers of the same children responded to the Behavioral Problems Instrument. The results indicated that authoritarian parenting style (42.69%) was the dominant style among Bahraini mothers of preschoolers from mothers’ perceptions. It is followed by cruelty style (13.04%) and authoritative style (11.86%). The results also showed a significant correlation between two parenting styles authoritarian and cruelty used by Bahraini mothers and attention deficit, hyperactivity and impulsiveness, and aggression among Bahraini preschoolers. It was found the authoritarian style is positively correlated with the three behavioral problems; whereas the cruelty style is positively correlated with aggression only.

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