10.1177/0146167205280910 PERSONALITY AND SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY BULLETIN Rholes et al. / ATTACHMENT AND PARENTING Avoidant Attachment and the Experience of Parenting W. Steven Rholes Texas A&M University Jeffry A. Simpson University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus Mike Friedman Texas A&M University Guided by attachment theory, this research investigated connec- tions between avoidant attachment styles and the experience of parenting after the birth of a couple’s first child. One hundred and six couples completed a battery of measures approximately 6 weeks before and 6 months after the birth of their first child. As anticipated, parents with more avoidant attachment styles expe- rienced greater stress after the birth of their child and perceived parenting as less satisfying and personally meaningful. Attach- ment theory maintains that adult attachment styles should affect relationships with adults and with one’s children. The present findings provide some of the first evidence that self- reported adult romantic attachment styles, which have been the focus of attachment research by social and personality psycholo- gists, are systematically associated with parent-child relation- ships. They also provide insight into the processes through which secure and insecure attachment styles might be transmitted from one generation to the next. Keywords: attachment style; avoidance; transition to parenthood; stress It requires no great insight to realize that [people with avoidant attachment styles] are deeply distrustful of close relationships and terrified of allowing themselves to rely on anyone else, in some cases in order to avoid the pain of being rejected and in others to avoid being sub- jected to pressure to become someone else’s caretaker. —John Bowlby, The Making and Breaking of Affectional Bonds (1979, p. 138) According to attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969), evo- lutionary forces have created predispositions in human infants to form strong emotional bonds to their care- givers because such bonds increase infants’ chances of survival. The normative states associated with this evolved “attachment” system are feelings of vulnerability when separated from attachment figures and a sense of security when in their presence; the normative behavior produced by the system is to seek physical and psycho- logical proximity to attachment figures when distressed. Experiences with caregivers, however, may alter the way in which the attachment system operates. If an infant’s efforts to seek comfort and security from caregivers in times of distress are habitually rebuffed or if they elicit an unpredictable mixture of acceptance and rejection, insecure attachment patterns (avoidant-resistant or anxious-resistant) typically develop (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978; Bowlby, 1988; Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985; van IJzendoorn, 1995). If comfort seeking is routinely accepted, that is, if parenting is responsive to an infant’s emotional states, secure attachments typically develop (Ainsworth et al., 1978; De Wolff & van IJzendoorn, 1997). When attachments are secure, the normative states and behaviors associated with attach- ment are readily apparent. In contrast, when attach- ments are avoidant, infants are reluctant to seek comfort from caregivers, and when they are anxious, caregivers have little capacity to calm distress and create feelings of security. The social and personality research literature pro- vides ample evidence in support of the view expressed in 275 Authors’ Note: This research was supported by National Institutes of Health Grant MH49599-05. The first two authors contributed equally to this research. The authors would like to thank Ramona Paetzold for her incisive commentary. Please address correspondence to W. Steven Rholes, Department of Psychology, Texas A&M University, CollegeSta- tion, TX 77843-4235; e-mail: wsr@psyc.tamu.edu. Editor’s Note: Timothy J. Strauman served as guest action editor for this article. PSPB, Vol. 32 No. 3, March 2006 275-285 DOI: 10.1177/0146167205280910 © 2006 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.