Several alternative attachment measures are available, and most of them have good reliability (both internal
consistency and test /C0retest reliability) and construct validity. When measures of social desirability bias are
included in attachment studies, the attachment measures do not seem to be contaminated with bias.
There is still room to improve measures of attachment-related variables. The attachment anxiety subscales of
many of the measures do not have any or many positively worded items, and as Fraley and his colleagues have
shown, attachment insecurity scales discriminate better on their insecure ends than on their secure (i.e., non-
avoidant and non-anxious) ends. When this problem has been tackled, as has happened in creating the ECR-R,
anxiety and avoidance become more highly correlated with each other. This probably happens because expand-
ing the scales at their secure ends in similar ways causes the two kinds of security items to correlate with each
other, which in turn makes the scales as wholes correlate more with each other. Whether or not this leads to
weaker detection of distinct effects of anxiety and avoidance remains unclear.
Enough work has been done to create and evaluate measures of attachment theory’s key constructs that we
can be confident that the theory is worth pursuing further with even better measures. We hope the present chap-
ter stirs interest in providing such measures.
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ties, coping, and social support. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships ,31,1/C031.446 15. MEASURES OF ADULT ATTACHMENT AND RELATED CONSTRUCTS
IV. INTERPERSONAL STYLES