Please don’t leave me! BIS/BAS, attachment styles, and responses to a relationship threat

Abstract

Adult attachment styles as well as sensitivities of the behavioural inhibition and activation systems (BIS/BAS) have been described as vulnerabilities that predict a person’s distress and approach versus avoidance in threatening situations, but the relations among these constructs are not yet clear. In this study, 202 female undergraduates were randomly assigned to three relationship threat conditions: They were to imagine that their partner would spend time with either another man, a woman of average attractiveness, or a highly attractive woman (a picture of the person was also shown). Dispositional threat responsiveness (BIS) moderated the effect of threat intensity on distress, such that high BIS was associated with distress primarily in the high threat condition. Anxious attachment was strongly linked with distress across all three conditions. BAS sensitivity related to approach tendencies, and avoidant attachment related to distancing efforts. BIS/BAS and attachment styles were slightly to moderately related but not to the point of redundancy. Both attachment styles and BIS/BAS levels appear to contribute to the prediction of relationship threat responses, but in clearly distinguishable patterns.