1. Individual differences in adult attachment: Disentangling two assessment traditions.
- Author
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Bernier, Annie, Larose, Simon, and Boivin, Michel
- Subjects
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SECURITY (Psychology) , *ATTACHMENT behavior , *ATTACHMENT theory (Psychology) , *ADULTS , *INTERVIEWING - Abstract
The goal of this paper was to disentangle the contributions of type of measurement and relational domain to the lack of concordance between adult attachment measures. Eighty-six college students completed the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) and self-reported measures of attachment security adapted to their relationships with four different relational partners. Results showed that whereas the AAI main dimensions were unrelated to self-reports relative to any partner, reports of attachment security with different partners were interrelated. Further, very few of the AAI State of Mind scales related to self-reported attachment security, but the AAI Experience scales did relate to self-reports in a theoretically consistent manner. Finally, the AAI scales of Idealization and Lack of Recall correlated positively with self-reported attachment when controlling for experiences reported on the AAI. The results suggest that a fundamental distinction between adult attachment measures could be the degree of automaticity of the constructs tapped, and that attachment self-reports may be biased by defensive information-processing strategies among dismissing individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2007
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