1998/02/01 by Kenneth N. Levy, Sidney J. Blatt, Phillip R. Shaver · 1 citation
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Attachment and Relationship Dynamics #Family Dynamics and Relationships #Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development #Psychology #Social psychology #Developmental psychology #Attachment theory
paper · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.74.2.407
openalex publication_date 1998/02/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/11
Relationships between attachment styles and the content and structure of mental representations of parents were investigated. Undergraduates completed 3- and 4-category measures of attachment style and wrote descriptions of their parents. Securely attached participants' parental representations were characterized by differentiati on, elaboration, benevolence, and nonpunitiveness. Representations by dismissing participants were characterized by less differentiation and more punitiveness and malevolence. Fearful participants also described their parents as relatively punitive and malevolent, but their representations were well differentiated and conceptually complex. Anxious-ambivalent participants described their parents ambivalently as both punitive and benevolent.