Attachment May Have Help the Huma Race to Survive

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From an evolutionary perspective, attachment has helped the human race survive. Infants and young children need an attachment system and caregiver. Bowlby (1969) argued the attachment system influenced how a person thought, felt and behaved in relationships. Bowlby (1973) explained that these attachment systems are cognitive processes which begin early in a child's development and are likely to stay influential throughout their life through their personal expectations and behaviour. Since the 1970's attachment theory has been further refined by academics such as Collins and Read (1994) who state that the attachment system consists of working models which are internal knowledge structures that organise and interpret previous experiences. These are used to develop ‘if then’ situations that can be used when necessary. Collins and Allard (2001) explain that these working models, just like schemas, are hypothetical structures stored in long-term memory. Bowlby (1969) proposed that from infancy to adolescence individuals develop expectations of attachment figures based on the experiences and environments they were exposed to, to be then incorporated into the working models of attachment. According to Collins and Allard (2001) attachment in adulthood can be defined into four attachment styles; secure, preoccupied, dismissing and fearful. These are derived from two underlying dimensions, anxiety and avoidance. Attachment style runs along a continuum and an individual will relate to different styles in different situations. Collins and Read (1994) propose that the working model is made up of four components, the first being memories of experiences related to attachment. The second comprised of the attitudes, beliefs and expectations a p... ... middle of paper ... ...uals do care, they are able to have relationships with other people. The purpose of this report is to reinforce the findings of previous research by investigating whether relationship conflict in a romantic relationship where one of the partner’s attachment orientation is avoidant does lead to negative feelings of self. There are three hypotheses, the first is that attachment-avoidance will be positively associated with increase in negative emotions; the second hypothesis suggests that attachment-avoidance will be positively associated with increased levels of relationship conflict and the third suggests a higher level of relationship conflict will be positively related to increase feelings of negative emotions. The study is a diary study looking at Romantic and Close relationships and for the purpose of this report only the romantic condition will be investigated.

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