The effectiveness of attachment security priming in improving positive affect and reducing negative affect: a systematic review
The effectiveness of attachment security priming in improving positive affect and reducing negative affect: a systematic review
Attachment security priming has been extensively used in relationship research to explore the contents of mental models of attachment and examine the benefits derived from enhancing security. This systematic review explores the effectiveness of attachment security priming in improving positive affect and reducing negative affect in adults and children. The review searched four electronic databases for peer reviewed journal articles. Thirty empirical studies met our inclusion criteria, including 28 adult and 2 child and adolescent samples. The findings show that attachment security priming improved positive affect and reduced negative affect relative to control primes. Supraliminal and subliminal primes were equally effective in enhancing security in one-shot prime studies (we only reviewed repeated priming studies using supraliminal primes so could not compare prime types in these). Global attachment style moderated the primed style in approximately half of the studies. Importantly, repeated priming studies showed a cumulative positive effect of security priming over time. We conclude that repeated priming study designs may be the most effective. More research is needed that explores the use of attachment security priming as a possible intervention to improve emotional wellbeing, in particular for adolescents and children.
Anxiety, Attachment, Depression, Negative affect, Positive affect, Security, Security priming
Rowe, Angela C.
961710a1-32ad-4659-8ff2-4239d67974a5
Gold, Emily
16a36aaa-557e-4f53-9b85-d0c3c93aabf1
Carnelley, Katherine
02a55020-a0bc-480e-a0ff-c8fe56ee9c36
4 February 2020
Rowe, Angela C.
961710a1-32ad-4659-8ff2-4239d67974a5
Gold, Emily
16a36aaa-557e-4f53-9b85-d0c3c93aabf1
Carnelley, Katherine
02a55020-a0bc-480e-a0ff-c8fe56ee9c36
Rowe, Angela C., Gold, Emily and Carnelley, Katherine
(2020)
The effectiveness of attachment security priming in improving positive affect and reducing negative affect: a systematic review.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17 (3), [968].
(doi:10.3390/ijerph17030968).
Abstract
Attachment security priming has been extensively used in relationship research to explore the contents of mental models of attachment and examine the benefits derived from enhancing security. This systematic review explores the effectiveness of attachment security priming in improving positive affect and reducing negative affect in adults and children. The review searched four electronic databases for peer reviewed journal articles. Thirty empirical studies met our inclusion criteria, including 28 adult and 2 child and adolescent samples. The findings show that attachment security priming improved positive affect and reduced negative affect relative to control primes. Supraliminal and subliminal primes were equally effective in enhancing security in one-shot prime studies (we only reviewed repeated priming studies using supraliminal primes so could not compare prime types in these). Global attachment style moderated the primed style in approximately half of the studies. Importantly, repeated priming studies showed a cumulative positive effect of security priming over time. We conclude that repeated priming study designs may be the most effective. More research is needed that explores the use of attachment security priming as a possible intervention to improve emotional wellbeing, in particular for adolescents and children.
Text
ijerph Rowe, Gold, Carnelley PURE
- Accepted Manuscript
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 21 January 2020
e-pub ahead of print date: 4 February 2020
Published date: 4 February 2020
Additional Information:
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
Keywords:
Anxiety, Attachment, Depression, Negative affect, Positive affect, Security, Security priming
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 437808
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/437808
ISSN: 1660-4601
PURE UUID: c391ba08-ca37-4669-99af-2ce121acbbb8
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 18 Feb 2020 17:30
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 02:51
Export record
Altmetrics
Contributors
Author:
Angela C. Rowe
Author:
Emily Gold
Download statistics
Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.
View more statistics
