Attachment security to mother, father, and the parental unit

The purpose of the present study was to test for a relationship between security of childhood attachment (secure/insecure) to parents individually and parents as a unit. A total of 138 adolescent subjects (mean age = 14.54, 64 males and 74 females) participated in a retrospective-longitudinal study in which their childhood attachments (prior to 10 years of age) to each parent and the parental unit were assessed. Subjects reported the same attachment type (secure/insecure) to each parent individually as well as to the parental unit. That is, children who were insecurely attached to one parent were significantly more likely to be insecurely attached to the other parent as well as the parental unit. These findings are consistent with other empirical findings in this area of study.