If there is one word that has been misunderstood in our time it’s precisely ‘attachment’, so much so that it hasn’t been given the importance it deserves. However, what few people know is that, from a psychological point of view, this concept allows us to understand human relationships and the way we form emotional bonds.
Lucía Jiménez, a Spanish psychologist and sexologist, discusses this concept: “In psychology, attachment is an evolutionary mechanism that ensures the survival of the species through collaboration with other individuals. It has a lot to do with how we react or feel when we share our emotional world with other people.”
This concept didn’t arise spontaneously. John Bowlby, an English psychiatrist and child psychoanalyst, developed the “attachment theory” in the 1960s, and defined it as a natural tendency in which newborns form close emotional bonds with certain individuals, in this case, with primary caregivers such as mothers, fathers, or others.
According to this theory, our ability to regulate ourselves is related to how our primary attachment figure interacts with us through emotional regulation, the ability to attune to be on the same page, and the way they respond to our needs.
In this regard, the American psychoanalyst Mary Ainsworth identified the different types of attachment through her “strange situation” study. She discovered that the more stable and secure the bond with the attachment figure, the greater the child’s freedom to explore their environment and learn from it. Consequently, they are able to regulate their emotions more easily.
Based on the children’s different reactions in this study, the following attachment styles were defined:
Secure: When the attachment figure leaves, they feel some anxiety but are able to self-regulate. When the attachment figure returns, they welcome them warmly.
Avoidant: These children showed indifference when separated from the adult. When the adult returns, they ignore or avoid them.
Anxious: In the study, these children showed a high level of anxiety during separation and struggled to calm down. In these cases, when the attachment figure returns, it takes them a while to calm down and feel secure.
Disorganized: There are many inconsistencies here, because although they feel distress at being abandoned, they show indifference when reunited with the attachment figure. There is no clear pattern of behavior, and in most cases, these are children who come from violent or dysfunctional homes.
According to experts, behavioral patterns formed during childhood aren’t decisive, although they do influence adulthood. This is because the attachment figure changes over time and can be either parents, friends, or a partner.
Having a healthy, stable, and secure bond in adulthood allows for the cultivation of a consistent attachment style. Similarly, insecure experiences can trigger a more insecure attachment style.
Well, now let’s get to the point: how do these attachment styles truly manifest in romantic relationships? According to Lucía Jiménez, adults think in abstract terms and replace physical closeness with emotional closeness, which gives rise to this classification:
Secure attachment: Characterized by building trusting relationships. People with this attachment style have good self-esteem and feel comfortable sharing their feelings with those they trust. When they need help, they feel confident enough to ask for it.
Anxious attachment: In this case, the person worries about their partner’s feelings toward them. They are demanding, need-oriented, experience insecurity regarding the bond, and feel greatly anxious when relationships end. They have significant difficulty self-regulating, and their reactions are very intense.
During their childhood, they had to rely on unpredictable figures who were sometimes there and sometimes not, which is why they are always on guard against the possibility that others might not support them or might abandon them.
Avoidant attachment: This is characterized by a lack of connection with one’s own emotions and those of others. These individuals see the needs of others as demands and tend to feel invaded. They feel uncomfortable when they form intimacy with someone and begin to depend on that person. They likely didn’t receive the necessary care in childhood and were forced to suppress their needs to avoid suffering.
Disorganized attachment: In this type of attachment, individuals experience intense love-hate emotions for someone, not really deciding on how they feel about the other person. They may be very afraid of abandonment but don’t display any protest behavior.
The Spanish psychologist and sexologist explains that each attachment style has a “danger zone”, in which a series of strategies that allow the person to restore their sense of security are activated.
In anxious attachment, the danger zone consists of neutral messages, which are interpreted as negative. These people are constantly trying to decipher things that aren’t that deep. Their nervous system is hypervigilant because they feel they are going to be betrayed.
But how is the safe zone reestablished? In this case, when a person receives an affirmative response confirming that everything is okay, the attachment system calms down and a sense of tranquility returns.
In avoidant attachment, for example, the “danger zone” occurs when they feel that intimacy is too intense. So they start looking for every excuse possible, focus on minor flaws, flirt with other people, and so on. In this way, they adopt deactivation behaviors to suppress the attachment system, whose biological function is to get closer to the other person.
And although it may seem contradictory, it’s more common than we think for a person with an anxious tendency to form a romantic relationship with an avoidant person.
This phenomenon is discussed by Jiménez, who points out that the human mind is far too complex and, as the theory of the “self-fulfilling prophecy” suggests, we end up helping to make our beliefs come true.
The avoidant person will get out of that relationship thinking that nothing they do will ever be enough, that too much is always demanded of them, and that people are dependent. On the other hand, the anxious person will feel that they cannot trust others, that they are always abandoned or rejected, and that no one will give them what they need or are looking for.
By stating the above, I don’t mean to say that a relationship like this can’t work, although the emotional needs are clearly very different. Ultimately, it’s a situation where someone who avoids emotional intensity and closeness is drawn to a person who constantly seeks expressions of love. That’s why the key lies in consciously working on intimacy and commitment as a couple.
Something like attachment doesn’t define a person or a relationship. The important thing is to understand that we all express our feelings and emotions in different ways, and that doesn’t mean one person loves more or the other loves less. To do this, we need to know and understand our personal history and find a balance where we can love ourselves and love each other #sinrecato.
Traducción del español: Catalina Oviedo Brugés
