How does your attachment style influence your mindset? - Security, insecurity and rigidity in relationships and dating The Relationship Maze

Are you aware of your attachment style in relationships? Do you know what activates you into feeling insecure in a relationship? Knowing your attachment style will be hugely beneficial in understanding how you relate to other people. In this episode we consider whether your mindset is determined by your attachment style. We ask whether an insecure attachment style is more likely to lead to a fixed mindset and conversely whether a growth mindset can contribute to changing your attachment style. We briefly discuss the four attachment styles and how they manifest in relationships: secure, anxious-preoccupied, avoidant-dismissive and fearful-disorganised. Neither attachment styles nor mindsets are set in stone - a growth mindset can contribute to developing security in relationships.

Your attachment style is your specific way of relating to other people. Attachment Theory was originally developed by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth. As a child you create an internal working model or template of relationships  based on your experiences with your primary care giver(s). As adults we carry forward these templates; they will inform what we expect of relationships and our partners and how we respond to their behaviour. While these templates are not set in stone, they originate in our childhood experiences and get confirmed or amended with subsequent experiences in adult life.
The following are a very brief summary of the different attachment styles:

Secure attachment

 You find it easy to establish strong, intimate relationships. You can share how you feel - the good, the bad and the ugly. You trust other people and are happy to both give and receive love. You can depend on your partner but also be independent.
 
Insecure attachment

Anxious-preoccupied: you are very concerned about being abandoned by your partner - ultimately you cannot trust anybody to stick around for long. You need quite a lot of validation and reassurance by your partner and will often be experienced as 'needy' in the relationship. You spend a lot of time thinking about the relationship, constantly analysing what has been said and what this may mean.

Avoidant-dismissive: you are highly independent and struggle with too much closeness to your partner. You easily feel suffocated and trapped. You cannot really trust anyone to be there for you in the long run so you may as well best rely only on yourself. You tend to keep your feelings to yourself.

Fearful-disorganised: you want closeness but are also highly worried about being too dependent on anybody else. You want affection but are also highly suspicious of anybody who offers it to you. You may engage in a lot of risky behaviour and may be more likely to end up in a relationship that is violent. You struggle to regulate your emotions.

Roughly 50% of adults have a secure attachment style with the remainder of the population displaying an insecure attachment, that is either anxious (20%), avoidant (25%) or fearful (5%).

A relationship is secure if one partner is secure. The most common presentation in couples therapy is one where one partner is anxious and the other is avoidant.
 
With an insecure attachment there is arguably a higher likelihood for a fixed mindset where a partner is either idealised or the relationship is experienced as threatened if any conflict arises. Conversely, a secure partner is more likely to have a growth mindset: relationships are seen as evolving, a partner's imperfection are acknowledged and not seen as threatening to the relationship overall and conflict is seen as inevitable and a possibility for learning about each other's differences.  Having a growth mindset enables the development of a secure attachment and vice versa. Both are intrinsically linked.

To find out more about your attachment style and how partners with secure or insecure attachment styles interact with each other listen