The authors explored the contribution of individual differences in attachment orientations to the experience of sexual intercourse and its association with relationship quality. In Study 1, 500 participants completed self-report scales of attachment orientations and sexual experience. The findings indicated that whereas attachment anxiety was associated with an ambivalent construal of sexual experience, attachment avoidance was associated with more aversive sexual feelings and cognitions. In Study 2, 41 couples reported on their attachment orientations and provided daily diary measures of sexual experiences and relationship interactions for a period of 42 days. Results showed that attachment anxiety amplified the effects of positive and negative sexual experiences on relationship interactions. In contrast, attachment avoidance inhibited the positive relational effect of having sex and the detrimental relational effects of negative sexual interactions. The authors discuss the possibility that attachment orientations are associated with different sex-related strategies and goals within romantic relationships.

Three studies examine the effects of stress on the accessibility of proximity-related thoughts. In all the studies, participants reported on their attachment style, and the accessibility of proximity themes and worries in a lexical decision task was assessed upon the priming of a stress or neutral word. In Study 2, the primed stress word was semantically related to attachment themes. In Study 3, lexical decisions were made under low or high cognitive load conditions. Overall, the priming of a stress word led to increased accessibility of proximity themes, regardless of attachment style. Anxious-ambivalent people also showed high accessibility to proximity themes and worries in both neutral and stress contexts. In most conditions, avoidant persons' reactions were similar to those of secure persons. However, they showed no accessibility to proximity worries even after the priming of a semantically related word and reacted with high accessibility to these worries upon the addition of cognitive load.In his classic trilogy, Bowlby (1969, 1973, 1980) developed an ethological theory about the function, antecedents, and consequences of the activation of the attachment system in humans. However, the vast majority of attachment studies have adopted an individual differences perspective, dealing with Bowlby's (1973, 1988) statements about the effects of a person's history of attachment experiences on his or her attachment style. This trend is mainly noted in adult attachment studies, which have focused on the ways people differing in attachment style differ in the way they regulate distress. Our study attempts to integrate the normative and intraindividual components of attachment theory and to examine Bowlby's hypothesis about the effect of stress arousal on the activation of the attachment system. Specifically, we examine whether a stress context cognitively activates the attachment system in most individuals while, at the same time, examining whether and how individual differences in attachment style may color this activation.Attachment, Stress Arousal, and Distress Regulation One basic statement of Bowlby's (1969Bowlby's ( , 1973Bowlby's ( , 1980 theory is that all human beings are born with an attachment system aimed at maintaining proximity to significant others

Given the powerful implications of relationship quality for health and well-being, a central mission of relationship science is explaining why some romantic relationships thrive more than others. This large-scale project used machine learning (i.e., Random Forests) to 1) quantify the extent to which relationship quality is predictable and 2) identify which constructs reliably predict relationship quality. Across 43 dyadic longitudinal datasets from 29 laboratories, the top relationship-specific predictors of relationship quality were perceived-partner commitment, appreciation, sexual satisfaction, perceived-partner satisfaction, and conflict. The top individual-difference predictors were life satisfaction, negative affect, depression, attachment avoidance, and attachment anxiety. Overall, relationship-specific variables predicted up to 45% of variance at baseline, and up to 18% of variance at the end of each study. Individual differences also performed well (21% and 12%, respectively). Actor-reported variables (i.e., own relationship-specific and individual-difference variables) predicted two to four times more variance than partner-reported variables (i.e., the partner’s ratings on those variables). Importantly, individual differences and partner reports had no predictive effects beyond actor-reported relationship-specific variables alone. These findings imply that the sum of all individual differences and partner experiences exert their influence on relationship quality via a person’s own relationship-specific experiences, and effects due to moderation by individual differences and moderation by partner-reports may be quite small. Finally, relationship-quality change (i.e., increases or decreases in relationship quality over the course of a study) was largely unpredictable from any combination of self-report variables. This collective effort should guide future models of relationships.

The current research focuses on the detrimental effects of attachment insecurities on sexuality and relationship quality. A community sample of 96 women completed self-report scales tapping attachment orientations; relationship satisfaction; sex-related affect and cognitions; and sexual functioning. Findings indicate that although both attachment anxiety and avoidance were associated with aversive sexual affect and cognitions, attachment anxiety was more detrimental to sexual functioning. In addition, only attachment anxiety was significantly associated with relational and sexual dissatisfaction, however, sexual satisfaction mediates the association between attachment anxiety and relationship satisfaction. The possibility that attachment orientations are associated with different strategies and interaction goals in the operation of the sexual system within romantic relationships is discussed.

This study examines the association between adult attachment style and the way people react to the crisis of divorce. A research group of 120 participants undergoing legal procedures related to divorce and a control group of 108 married participants were classified according to their attachment style (secure, avoidant, anxious-ambivalent) and completed the Mental Health Inventory. In addition, the divorced participants answered scales tapping appraisal of divorce and ways of coping with it. As expected, divorced participants reported more distress than married ones. This effect was found among avoidant and anxious-ambivalent participants, but not among secure participants. Significant differences were also found among attachment groups in appraisal and coping variables. Structural analyses supported the hypothesis that appraisal and coping mediate the association between attachment style and mental health during the crisis of divorce. Results are discussed in terms of attachment theory.