Anxious Attachment Style: How It Develops & How To Cope

Anxious attachment is thought to stem from childhood and can stick with a person into adulthood. 

While there is not always a clear-cut answer for why someone may develop an anxious attachment, it could be a result of some of the following factors:

1. Inconsistent parenting

Parenting is inconsistent when there are times of support and responsiveness to the child’s needs, but at other times, they are cold, insensitive, or emotionally unavailable. 

For example, one time when you were angry as a child, your parent reassured you and talked you through your difficult feelings, but the next time it happened, they dismissed you and told you to ‘get over it.’

The child may become confused about their relationship with a caregiver, sending mixed signals.

This inconsistency can make it difficult for the child to understand what their parent’s behavior means and what kind of response to expect, resulting in insecurity and anxiety.

2. Caregiver’s ‘emotional hunger’

This is where caregivers seek emotional or physical closeness with the child for the purpose of satisfying their own needs.

Because of this, they are neglecting the child’s emotional and physical needs.

These caregivers may appear intrusive and preoccupied with their child’s life and can be overprotective.

They may replace the actual love and affection of their child with using the child to feed their own needs.

For example, your mother insists on being involved in all your activities with your school friends, wanting to know every detail, and gets upset when you are apart.

She tells you that you are her ‘best friend in the whole world.’ As a result, you choose to spend most of your free time with your mother and feel guilty for spending time with others. 

The child, therefore, does not get their needs met and may put everyone else’s needs above their own as this is what they have been used to.

3. Anxious caregivers

Commonly, children with an anxious attachment style are likely to have parents who are also anxiously attached.

This is likely not due to genetic factors; rather, it is a continuation of behavioral patterns repeated throughout generations.

Moreover, without management, the anxiously attached child may grow up to have their own children who are anxiously attached.

For example, your father does not like to do activities alone and will become distressed if he is left by himself and tends to be clingy with others.

You assume this is typical behavior, and as a result, you also do not want to do activities alone. 

Anxious Attachment in Romantic and Sexual Relationships

In adulthood, anxious attachment profoundly influences romantic relationships.

Anxious adults often hold negative self-views combined with positive yet apprehensive views of their attachment figures.

They crave emotional support, closeness, and reassurance from their romantic partners.

Impact on Romantic Relationships:

• Early Stages: Anxious attachers tend to “go from 0 to 100” very quickly in early dating, seeking intense connection to eliminate uncertainty.

  They struggle immensely with slow-moving stages, uncertainty, and the possibility that their partner might be dating others or not prioritizing them. This triggers their “worthiness wounds”.

• Conflating Sex and Love: Anxiously attached people, especially women, tend to conflate sex and love, equating gratifying sexual experiences with a sense of being loved, valued, and protected.

  Conversely, disappointing sexual experiences can be interpreted as signs of disapproval or impending abandonment

• Conflict: Anxious attachment can exacerbate relational conflict. Bowlby anticipated that encounters with attachment figures that evoke conflict are powerful sources of anxiety and depression, as they touch upon an individual’s basic sense of self-worth and capacity for being cherished.

  The intensity of emotion in close relationships can activate early, forgotten wishes and disappointments from childhood, integrating them into present-day behavior and expectations, which Bowlby called the “risks of intimacy”.

• Dissatisfying Relationships: Highly anxious individuals may be involved in stable but ultimately dissatisfying romantic relationships.

  They may exaggerate adversities, become obsessed with abandonment thoughts, and display intense negative emotions.

  They often question whether their partners can be relied upon for comfort and support. 

Impact on Sexual Intimacy:

• Complex Approach: Anxious attachment is associated with a complex, ambivalent approach to sex. They are drawn to sex as a route to closeness and intimacy, using it to fulfill unmet needs for security and love, and to reduce fears of abandonment.

  They may equate gratifying sexual experiences with feeling loved and protected, which temporarily soothes their fears.

• Focus on Affection over Eroticism: Anxious adults often focus on affection and sex as “proof of love” rather than on the erotic aspects of sexuality.
• Risky Sexual Behavior: Attachment anxiety can interfere with safe sex practices, leading to negative beliefs about condoms, less condom use, lower perceived risk of STIs, and higher rates of unplanned pregnancy.

  Their desire for closeness and merger can lead them to risk their own and their partners’ health.

• Sexual Spiral: A common dynamic in anxious-avoidant pairings is the “anxious avoidant sexual spiral,” a pursue-withdraw dynamic applied to sex.

  In the early stages, there’s often strong sexual emphasis and intense chemistry, which feels great for both partners. The anxious partner feels wanted, and the avoidant partner enjoys the intimacy.

  However, as the relationship becomes more serious, the avoidant partner tends to pull away sexually, triggering the anxious partner’s fears.

• Carryover of Relational Worries: Anxious people’s relational worries often extend into the sexual realm, causing doubts about sexual self-confidence and potentially leading to conflicts, accepting unwanted sex, or using coercive tactics.

Triggers of Anxious Attachment

In romantic relationships, anxious attachment can be triggered by the actions or perceived actions of a partner. 

When triggered, someone with an anxious attachment style may become immediately emotional, jumping to worst-case scenarios about abandonment.

They may demand constant reassurance from their partner, become clingy, or act out to regain closeness. 

Since they may have difficulties regulating their emotions, they can appear overly dramatic or cry as a way to communicate their needs.

Some ways in which anxious attachment can be triggered include:

• Inconsistency and contrast – Anxiously attached people are hypersensitive to inconsistency, particularly the contrast between moments of connection and disconnection.

  Moving from a state of closeness to one of perceived disconnection (e.g., a partner being quiet or withdrawn after a good weekend) feels like a sudden shift from total safety to extreme danger, triggering disarray and a sense of powerlessness

• Perceived distance or distraction – e.g., your partner suddenly has more work responsibilities and spends time at home answering emails. 

• Forgetfulness – e.g., your partner forgets that it is your anniversary or forgets to pick you up an item from the shop that you requested. 

• Not paying attention – e.g., your partner spends a lot of time on their phone when you’re together, or you get a new haircut, but your partner fails to notice anything new. 

• Not receiving enough attention – e.g., your partner spends a lot of their free time socializing with friends instead of you.

• Getting into arguments – e.g., you argue with your partner about how they haven’t washed the dishes, and you end up reacting by shouting and crying. 

• Having trust broken – e.g., you find out that your partner lied about where they were last night. 

These triggers can result in the anxiously attached person feeling even more insecure about their relationship and being filled with more self-doubt.