 30. Attachment Theory and Personality  643
change. Attachment research is now routine -
ly featured in traditional outlets in person -
ality psychology, including the Journal of 
Personality and Social Psychology: Person -
ality Processes and Individual Differences, 
the Journal of Personality, the European 
Journal of Personality, and the Journal of 
Research in Personality . Moreover, the pre -
vious edition of this volume included the 
first chapter on attachment to be featured 
in a major handbook of personality science. 
Our objective in this chapter is to stimulate 
additional research at the interface of per -
sonality and attachment by outlining some 
of the contemporary debates in attachment 
theory and explaining how those debates are 
relevant to modern personality psychology. 
We begin with a brief overview of attach -
ment theory, highlighting the origins of the 
theory and how attachment dynamics have 
been studied in infants and children. Next, 
we review modern extensions of attachment 
theory, focusing primarily on the study of at -
tachment in adulthood as it was popularized 
by social/personality psychologists. Finally, 
we discuss some of the new and enduring 
challenges faced by attachment theory and 
explain how they can be informed by, and 
also inform, contemporary methods and de -
bates in personality psychology.
A Brief Overview of Attachment Theory
The Attachment  System
Bowlby developed attachment theory to 
explain the intense distress expressed by 
infants when separated from their parents. 
He observed that separated infants go to ex -
traordinary lengths (e.g., crying, clinging, 
and frantically searching) either to prevent 
separation from, or reestablish proximity 
to, a missing parent. At the time of Bowlby’s 
first writings, psychoanalytic theorists held 
that such emotional outbursts were manifes -
tations of immature dependency, and many 
behaviorists thought that they were signs of 
dysfunctional parental reinforcements of de -
pendency. Bowlby observed, however, that 
such expressions were common among oth -
erwise well-  functioning children who had 
been separated from their primary caregiv -
ers. Moreover, he noted that such expres -
sions are common to a wide variety of mam -malian species, suggesting that they serve an 
evolutionary function.
Drawing on ethological theory, Bowl -
by postulated that attachment behaviors,  
such as crying and searching, are adaptive 
responses to separation from a primary at -
tachment figure—  someone who has a his -
tory of providing support, protection, and 
care to the child. Because human infants, 
like other mammalian infants, cannot feed 
or protect themselves, they are highly de -
pendent on the care and protection of “older 
and wiser” adults. Bowlby argued that over 
the course of evolutionary history, infants 
who were able to attract the attention of, 
and maintain proximity to, an attachment 
figure (i.e., by looking cute or by engaging in 
attachment behaviors) would be more likely 
to survive to a reproductive age. According 
to Bowlby, a motivational control system, 
which he called the attachment behavioral 
system,  was gradually “designed” by natural 
selection to do just that.
The attachment behavioral system is an 
important concept in attachment theory, 
because it provides a conceptual bridge be -
tween ethological models of human develop -
ment (e.g., Hinde, 1966) and modern theo -
ries of emotion regulation and personality 
(e.g., English, Eldesouky, & Gross, Chapter 
24, this volume; see also Gillath et al., 2016; 
Mikulincer & Shaver, 2016). According to 
Bowlby, the attachment system essentially 
“asks” the following question: Is the attach -
ment figure nearby, accessible, and atten -
tive? If the child perceives the answer to be 
“yes,” he or she feels loved, secure, and con -
fident, and, behaviorally, is likely to explore 
his or her environment, play with others, 
and be sociable. If, however, the child per -
ceives the answer to be “no,” he or she expe -
riences anxiety and, behaviorally, is likely to 
exhibit attachment behaviors ranging from 
simple visual searching to active following 
and vocal signaling (see Figure 30.1). These 
behaviors continue until either the child is 
able to reestablish a desirable level of physi -
cal or psychological proximity to the attach -
ment figure, or the child wears down, as 
often happens in the context of a prolonged 
separation or loss. Bowlby believed that such 
experiences lead to despair and depression, 
and have the potential to shape the beliefs 
and expectations a child develops regarding 