Major Principles of Attachment Theory

D the past five decades, few theories in psychology have generated as much interest, research, and debate as attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969/1982, 1973, 1980, 1988) and its recent extensions (see Cassidy & Shaver, 2016). Attachment theory is an extensive, inclusive theory of personality and social development “from the cradle to the grave” (Bowlby, 1979, p. 129). Being a lifespan theory, it is relevant to several areas in psychology, including developmental, personality, social, cognitive, neuroscience, and clinical. Because attachment theory covers the entire life course, it has several fundamental principles and core hypotheses, most of which address how and why people think, feel, and behave in particular ways within relationships at different points of their lives. Given the focus of this volume, our primary goal in this chapter is to provide a brief, representative overview of the key principles and central hypotheses that underlie attachment theory, both as originally articulated by Bowlby and his contemporaries (e.g., Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) and as expanded upon in recent theory and research (Cassidy & Shaver, 2016). Attachment theory has two major components: (1) a normative component, which explains modal (species-typical) attachment processes and patterns of behavior in humans, and (2) an individual-difference component, which explains individual deviations from modal processes and behavioral patterns. Most of the major principles and hypotheses we discuss in this chapter are normative ones, but we also highlight principles associated with well-established individual differences in attachment patterns (in children) and attachment orientations (in adults), including how they are related to a host of personal and relational processes and outcomes. We began our work on this chapter by surveying the theoretical and empirical literature on attachment processes across the lifespan and generated an initial list of potential principles and hypotheses. We then asked several leading attachment scholars working in different areas of psychology (e.g., clinical, developmental, personality, social) to indicate what they thought were the most important principles/ hypotheses.1 Informed by this information, we next identified what we believe are nine of the most important, foundational principles and hypotheses that serve as the foundation of attachment theory (see Table 12.1, which serves as a guide to the following discussion). C H A P T E R 1 2