Attachment behavior.

Inattentive responding by research participants may decrease the reliability and validity of self-report measures. The current studies broaden the record of personality traits correlated with inattention by examining individual differences in attachment anxiety and avoidance among adults in romantic relationships. Based upon the characteristics typically exhibited by adults high on attachment avoidance, I expected an overlap between this personality trait and inattention, such that participants higher on attachment avoidance would exhibit higher levels of inattentive responding when answering self-report questions about their relationship. Two studies addressed this hypothesis using both self-report data from individuals and partner-report data from romantic couples to examine the association between a participant’s attachment avoidance and their level of inattentive responding while participating in research focusing on their romantic relationships. Self-reported attachment avoidance was associated with greater inattentive responding in both studies. However, partner-reported attachment avoidance was not significantly associated with inattentive responding in Study 2.

The purpose of the current study is to examine emotional and behavioral
interdependence within the triadic family system. Interdependence was assessed over
time between 17 participant groups of mothers, fathers and preschoolers. Responses of
each parent and preschooler were observed during story recitations that were chosen to
elicit positive or negative responses; observations included measures of attention,
external affect, and affective congruency. Parental self-report ratings of expressivity,
negative emotions, and child temperament were compared to observations during story
recitations, as well. Some father-child interactions appeared to be affected by story
condition. However, parent gender had little effect on parent-child interactions overall in
regards to child consistency. The findings suggest that children drive the interactions
more so than parents. Further research with a larger sample size is needed to fully examine the emotional and behavioral interdependence between parents and
preschoolers.