Attentional Bias Moderates the Link Between Attachment-Related Expectations and Non-suicidal Self-Injury

Repetitive thinking about the mother during distress moderates the link between children's attentional breadth around the mother and depressive symptoms in middle childhood

“…Three separate regression analyses were conducted predicting depressive symptoms according to selfreport, according to mother-report, and according to the multi-informant compound score respectively. As expected and in line with previous research Claes et al, 2016), results showed that there were no main effects of the attentional narrowing effect for depressive symptoms. There was a main effect of RTm for self-reported depressive symptoms, and the multi-informant compound score for depressive symptoms, but not for mother-reported depressive symptoms ( = .13, t(153) = 1.65, p = .10).…”

“…However, additional research suggested that, instead of being a uniformly maladaptive feature, the effect of a more narrow attentional field around the mother on children's adjustment depends on how children perceive the relationship with their mother. For example, it was repeatedly demonstrated that a more narrow attentional field around the mother can be found in children with high as well as low levels of trust in maternal support and that these levels predicted the nature of its effect Claes et al, 2016). More specifically, only when individuals had a more narrow attentional field around the mother, trust in maternal support predicted the prevalence of emotional and behavioral problems in middle childhood (replicated in two samples in Bosmans et al, 2013), and nonsuicidal self-injury in young adults (Claes et al, 2016).…”

“…For example, it was repeatedly demonstrated that a more narrow attentional field around the mother can be found in children with high as well as low levels of trust in maternal support and that these levels predicted the nature of its effect Claes et al, 2016). More specifically, only when individuals had a more narrow attentional field around the mother, trust in maternal support predicted the prevalence of emotional and behavioral problems in middle childhood (replicated in two samples in Bosmans et al, 2013), and nonsuicidal self-injury in young adults (Claes et al, 2016). So, children with a more narrow attentional field and at the same time less trust in maternal support had more emotional and behavioral problems whereas children with a more narrow attentional field and at the same more trust in maternal support had less emotional and behavioral problems.…”

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Children and Adolescents: Can Attachment Theory Contribute to Its Efficacy?

“…Three studies found that lack of self-reported trust (strategic process) was only linked to symptoms of psychopathology when children had a more narrow attentional field around mother (automatic process). This was found for both internalizing and externalizing behaviour problems (Bosmans, Koster et al2013) and for non-suicidal self-injury (Claes et al 2016). Consequently, this seems to suggest that only when children are strongly focused on mother, a low-quality attachment relationship puts children at elevated risk to develop emotional and behavioural problems.…”

“…First, with regard to emotion regulation strategies, there is abundant and robust evidence that insecurely attached children are at risk to develop emotional and behavioural problems because they fail to adequately regulate negative emotions (Brumariu 2015). While more securely attached children are more likely to seek attachment figure support as a protection against long-term maladaptive effects of distressing life events (Dujardin et al 2016), less securely attached children are less inclined to seek proximity and support (Dujardin et al 2016, Claes et al 2016). Instead, they start developing maladaptive strategies to regulate the negative emotions they experience during distress (Cassidy 1994).…”