Conscientiousness and attachment avoidance as moderators of the association between attachment anxiety and neuroticism

Abstract

Crawford, Shaver, and Goldsmith ((2007) How affect regulation moderates the association between anxious attachment and neuroticism, Attachment & Human Development 9, 95–109) suggested that attachment avoidance and conscientiousness may both serve as affect regulation strategies that allow individuals to down-regulate negative emotions, and thereby attenuate the usually strong association between neuroticism and general attachment anxiety. Their findings partially supported this hypothesis. As predicted, at high levels of neuroticism, both avoidance and conscientiousness were associated with decreased levels of attachment anxiety. Unexpectedly, however, at low levels of neuroticism, avoidance and conscientiousness were actually associated with increased, rather than decreased, attachment anxiety. In the current study, we replicated Crawford et al.’s results in a sample of 160 undergraduate students, and also extended this line of research by considering relationship-specific attachment with mother, father, best friend, and romantic partner. Very different patterns of results emerged in the relationship-specific analyses. We propose a more interpersonal perspective on personality to explain the pattern of results, one that considers how neuroticism, conscientiousness, and attachment avoidance are actually enacted in everyday social contexts.