What Is Attachment in Relationships? Secure vs. Insecure

Attachment is a close emotional bond that one person forms toward another. Children typically develop attachment with their parents or primary caregivers in the first few weeks and months of life.

But not all attachment is the same. The way we bond with and learn to react toward our parents in early life has been found to deeply affect the way we feel about and react toward other people throughout our lives.

There are four basic attachment styles: secure, insecure-avoidant, insecure-resistant (a.k.a. anxious attachment), and insecure-disorganized. Understanding yours may help you understand yourself better. Many therapists look at their patients’ attachment style to help them resolve internal conflicts or conflicts with others.

How do you know which attachment style you have?

In adults, a test called the adult attachment interview is the main way clinicians formally assess attachment styles, and researchers have developed many other, shorter questionnaires to assess attachment.

Researchers assess children’s attachment patterns based on their reaction to the famous Strange Situation Procedure. In this procedure, an infant is separated from their caregiver and then reunited a few minutes later.

The behavior the infant shows during the Strange Situation Procedure indicates their attachment style:

• Secure: The child is upset when separated and seeks contact and calms down after reuniting with the caregiver.
• Insecure-avoidant: Child doesn’t show much distress at being separated from caregiver, and avoids contact after the caregiver returns.
• Insecure-resistant: Child shows severe distress at separation but ambivalence after reuniting with their caregiver. 
• Insecure-disorganized: Child’s behavior is inconsistent at separation and reuniting — sometimes upset, sometimes ambivalent.

Here are some more attachment basics.

• What’s the best attachment style?: Secure attachment is considered to be the most beneficial attachment style, whereas insecure attachment styles are thought to lead to harmful emotions, thinking, and behavior in children and adults. People with secure attachment may be able to recover better from negative emotions and regain calm quickly, while insecurely attached people may find themselves getting more upset and having trouble calming down. This may translate to a wide range of effects throughout a person’s life.
• What does a secure attached person act like?: A person who has a secure attachment style may have a high level of self-confidence as well as trust in others. They’re comfortable relying on others and having other people rely on them. Research has found that children with secure attachments show more prosocial behavior.
• What does an anxious attached person act like?: Typical behavior from people with an insecure-resistant or anxious attachment style may include always seeking out closeness with others, rumination about and fear of abandonment, and needing a lot of care.
• What does an avoidant attached person act like?: Typical behavior from people who have an insecure-avoidant style may include being aloof or emotionally distant, being very self-reliant, and denying the need or suppressing the desire for attachment.
• How does attachment style affect adult relationships?: In many ways. For example, people with secure attachment styles tend to have higher levels of gratitude, self-confidence, self-acceptance, and satisfaction in romantic relationships and be comfortable asking for help from others than people with insecure attachment types.
• How many people are securely attached vs. insecurely attached?: According to an analysis of 20,000 Strange Situation Procedures, about half of people around the world are securely attached and half are insecurely attached. Here’s a breakdown: About 51.6% of people have a secure attachment style, while 14.7% have an insecure-avoidant style, 10.2% have an insecure-resistant style, and 23.5% have an insecure-disorganized style.
• Why do people get attached?: Many researchers of attachment argue that the ultimate purpose of infant attachment is evolutionary — to help infants survive by keeping their caregivers nearby.
• What affects attachment style?: The behavior of an infant’s parents toward them is thought to be the major factor that causes the infant to develop a particular attachment style. Experts believe that a parent’s sensitivity to their child is a key factor. However, genes and other environmental factors are thought to play a role.
• Do men and women have different attachment styles?: Anyone can have any attachment style. However, emerging evidence says yes, there may be minor differences on average. Women may have anxious attachment a little more often, and men may have avoidant attachment a little more often. This is a relatively new discussion in the attachment field, and more research is needed.

For a deeper dive on attachment and related ideas, explore these Relationship Smart articles:

• 7 Ways Childhood Trauma Can Affect Your Relationships
• 6 Tips for a Healthy Relationship: Manage Conflict and More
• Which Parenting Style Is Most Encouraged in Modern America?
• How to Break the Cycle of Generational Trauma: Expert Q&A
• What Is Stockholm Syndrome? Defending the Perpetrator