Abstract
The narration is the instrument that allows individual to organize his experience through a process of attribution and sharing of meaning within social interactions and to translate the extraordinary in normativity. As regards the narrative content there are “narrative genres” that impose thematic constraints on the way of narrating, but these also allow creative variations. According to the theoretical-clinical hypothesis of Life Themes (LTs), Love, Value, Power, Freedom, and Truth are shared attractors of meaning recurring in Life Stories. The influence of attachment system on the development of autobiographical narratives is shown in literature. This article presents a qualitative study of the specific dimensions and valences of the LTs in the adult attachment narratives. The study is part of a broader research project that aims to systematize the theoretical model of LTs in the narrative Self-construction, to study its connections and applications in the field of attachment theory, and to build a useful operative tool in the clinical assessment of patients’ stories. We also aimed to study the occurrence of the LTs in the Adult Attachment Interview transcripts, preliminarily exploring possible connections with Internal Working Models. 40 AAI transcripts of 20 men and 20 women (mean age was 33 years old), selected from a larger non-clinical sample employed in an adult attachment study, were analyzed using a phenomenological exploratory approach. For the research design we used a qualitative methodology that ensure a deep and intensive, rather than extensive, analysis, focusing on the complexity of meanings and discussing the results within the research group. Several indicators of LTs have been identified and the interpersonal dimensions were explored. An additional Theme emerged from the recurrence of some indicators: Ethic and Justice. In Dismissing subjects’ narrations the theme Value (in terms of being valued) emerges mostly, while in the Preoccupied ones the theme Power (in terms of impositions received), accompanied secondarily by Value and Freedom, occurs more frequently. The most frequent thematic indicators in the F group are related to Love and Truth. Clinical implications of an explicative model of critical Themes are discussed.
Highlights
The narrative approach in clinical psychology (Bruner, 1990, 1997, 2003) focuses on the biological need of purpose and meaning that drives human beings to the use of narration as a mean of reorganization of one’s own stream of experiences, making it understandable for oneself and sharable with others (Spira and Wall, 2006)
The present study aims to investigate the occurrence of Life Themes (LTs) in the transcripts of Attachment Interview (AAI)
Textual corpus consisted of 40 AAI transcripts randomly selected from a larger textual corpus of a hundred of AAIs collected in non-clinical convenience samples that were recruited for previous adult attachment studies (Di Fini, 2014 - unpublished doctoral dissertation)
Summary
The narrative approach in clinical psychology (Bruner, 1990, 1997, 2003) focuses on the biological need of purpose and meaning that drives human beings to the use of narration as a mean of reorganization of one’s own stream of experiences, making it understandable for oneself and sharable with others (Spira and Wall, 2006). The theoretical-clinical hypothesis of Life Themes (LTs) postulates the existence of powerful attractors of meanings, beyond individual and cultural variations (Csikszentmihalyi and Beattie, 1979; Veglia, 2013; Veglia and Di Fini, 2017). LTs are fundamental epistemic motivational systems, driving and supporting the human brain’s endeavor to organize the interpretation of experiences by means of narration, generating countless unique stories, essential in developing self-concept and cultural affiliation. In literature some authors consider the existence of “nuclear” and constant themes that permeate life stories (McAdams, 2001), as well as constraints and opportunities for the development of the narrative self construction (Veglia, 1999, 2013). It was considered: the theme’s irreducibility; the utmost independence of each theme from contextual characteristics; the presence of the theme in every culture and every historical period examined; the intrinsic structural capacity of the theme to attract and generate meaning both in the form of expressions and in the construction of the self and of the dialogue between parts of the self (Veglia and Di Fini, 2017)
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