AFFECTIVE BONDS: HOW THEY DEVELOP, TYPES, EXAMPLES - GEOGRAFÍA - 2025

The emotional ties are deep and lasting ties that connect one person to another through space and time. It is a phenomenon that appears in most of the important affective relationships in a person's life.

The field in which affective ties have been most studied is in that of relationships between parents and children. Young children, being totally dependent on their parents, develop a type of bond with them commonly known as attachment.

However, emotional ties can appear in many other areas of life. Recently, discoveries made in the field of the family have been extrapolated to others such as relationships or friendship.

The formation of adequate emotional bonds is of great importance for the mental and emotional stability of people. The type of attachment developed during childhood will produce a series of consequences throughout the individual's life.

How do emotional ties develop?

Attachment theory was developed mainly in the 1960s. When I began to study the phenomenon of emotional ties in people, several approaches emerged from which an attempt was made to explain what was happening.

Researchers from this time focused primarily on the relationship between mothers and their newborn children. However, later it was discovered that they could be extrapolated to many other situations, such as relationships or friendship.

The first explanation for the appearance of attachment bonds was that they arise due to a classical conditioning process. In the case of mother-child relationships, the child needs her caregiver to provide her with food. In his mind, therefore, the mother would quickly associate herself with survival.

However, Bowlby (the originator of attachment theory) believed that there had to be some evolutionary reason for the emergence of emotional bonds. According to his hypothesis, children would be born with a predetermined tendency to form these bonds with their primary caregivers.

This is because, throughout history, children who stay close to their attachment figure tend to receive more protection and comfort; and, therefore, they would have a better chance of reaching adulthood alive.

Therefore, natural selection caused this tendency to form links to be passed from generation to generation.

Training

Researchers Peggy Emerson and Rudolph Schaffer studied how attachment bonds emerged in a longitudinal study of 60 children. These were observed every four weeks during their first year of life; and finally, again when they were 18 months old.

Based on their observations, Emerson and Schaffer discovered that bonding went through four phases: pre-attachment, indiscriminate attachment, discriminated attachment, and multiple attachments. We will see each of them below.

Pre-attachment phase

This phase would extend from the birth of the child to approximately three months of age. In it, children do not show any symptoms of attachment to their caregivers.

Babies in the pre-attachment phase would attract the attention of adults through crying, social smiling, and other innate mechanisms. They would respond to the child's calls, and the baby's positive responses would reinforce them to be aware of them.

Indiscriminate attachment phase

From about three months to seven, children begin to show a preference for being around some of their caregivers.

At this stage, the baby begins to develop the feeling that his parents or the people who take care of them will be able to respond to his needs.

In the second phase, children still accept the care of strangers; however, they are already beginning to differentiate between those with whom they are familiar and those with whom they are not. Your responses will be more positive towards the primary caregiver (usually the mother).

Discriminated attachment phase

From seven months to about one year of age, children show a strong preference for their primary caregiver. At this time, the baby feels very insecure around strangers, and will protest if they leave him in the hands of one of them.

On the other hand, it is also in this phase that children begin to show anxiety when separated from their primary caregiver. This is what is known as separation anxiety.

4- Multiple attachments

In this last phase, children have already fully developed the attachment bond with their primary reference figure. Now they can, therefore, form other emotional bonds with people who are also important in their life.

Thus, sometimes as early as nine months of age, infants begin to recognize other caregivers in addition to the mother (or primary reference figure). These can be the father, grandparents, siblings, close friends of the family…

Types

Both in the sphere of mother-child relationships and in those of a couple, four types of affective bond are traditionally described: secure, ambivalent, avoidant, and disorganized. Each of them will have different consequences in the life of the person.

Secure attachment

Secure attachment is mainly characterized by the appearance of symptoms of anxiety when the baby is separated from his main caregiver, and joy when he returns. Children who develop it trust their parents, and feel that they can depend on them.

Thus, when the caregiver leaves, the child appears angry, but trusts that he will eventually return. On the other hand, when frightened, the baby uses his mother or figure of reference to regain confidence. These children trust their caregiver enough to reach out to them in times of need.

In the realm of the couple, people who show this type of attachment trust themselves and the other person. For this reason, they tend not to show jealousy or insecurities, they leave a lot of space for the other, and they usually have very calm relationships without too many problems.

Ambivalent attachment

The second type of attachment is characterized by a dual relationship between mother and child. The baby needs its caregiver to survive; However, she is unable to trust her, because she has shown her on several occasions that she will not always be there to protect her.

These children show great stress when their mother leaves, but also, it does not disappear when the caregiver returns with them. They tend to be more shy babies, afraid of strangers, and less confident in exploring and playing.

In the world of the couple, people with this attachment style have a love-hate relationship with the other. They are generally very insecure and do not trust him; however, they need you to feel good emotionally.

Therefore, couples in which one of the partners exhibits this attachment style tend to have many problems, jealousy, drama and insecurities. Interestingly, those with ambivalent attachment tend to date people with avoidant attachment.

Avoidant attachment

Avoidant attachment is characterized by a child's lack of preference between his primary caregiver and a complete stranger. The theory is that the baby has been punished on previous occasions when she has trusted her parents. So now she feels that she has to deal with it on her own.

Thus, in the case of very young children with this type of attachment, they do not show any symptoms of stress when the caregiver leaves their side, and they do not show any signs of affection when they return. In general, these are cases in which the parents have been emotionally abusive with the children.

As for love relationships, the same symptoms are present in avoidant people. Even when they love their partner, they will tend to feel that they are being overwhelmed with their demands, and to continually withdraw from him. This avoidant behavior will make the other person feel very insecure.

In general, the avoidant tend to pair up with the ambivalent; and their relationships are characterized by all kinds of problems.

Disorganized attachment

Disorganized attachment is the least common of the four. It consists of a mix of avoidant and ambivalent patterns. Normally, it is caused by a way of behaving on the part of the caregivers that does not remain stable over time.

In the realm of the couple, people with disorganized attachment tend to seek physical closeness but emotional distance. In general, this type of relationship only appears if there have been cases of abuse.

Examples

Examples of different types of attachment can best be recognized in the field of the couple. Here we will examine how a person presenting each of the four types would respond to a very common situation: their partner going out to party without them.

A person with a secure attachment would not care at all. Because you trust both yourself and your partner, you would see it as totally normal and a sign of independence (which you would take as a positive).

On the contrary, someone with ambivalent attachment would see it as a clear symptom that their partner no longer loves them. He would think that he is going to find someone to replace him, or that he wants to forget about him because he is fed up.

Someone with avoidant attachment would react differently. You may worry that your partner wants to be unfaithful to you; but secretly he would be relieved to be able to get away from her for one night. In general, the feeling that predominates in the relationships of these individuals is that of overwhelm.

Finally, someone with a disorganized attachment may show avoidant or ambivalent responses at different times.

References

1. "The Story of Bowlby, Ainsworth, and Attachment Theory" in: Very Well Mind. Retrieved on: June 26, 2018 from Very Well Mind: verywellmind.com.
2. "Attachment Theory" in: Simply Psychology. Retrieved on: June 26, 2018 from Simply Psychology: simplypsychology.com.
3. "Affectionate bonds, what is your style?" en: The Mind is Wonderful. Retrieved on: June 26, 2018 from La Mente es Maravillosa: lamenteesmaravillosa.com.
4. "What are emotional ties ?: importance of a healthy childhood" in: Self-help resources. Retrieved on: June 26, 2018 from Self-help Resources: Recursosdeautoayuda.com.
5. "Attachment Theory" in: Wikipedia. Retrieved on: June 26, 2018 from Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org.