The relation of dissociation and mind wandering to unresolved/disorganized attachment: an experience sampling study

ABSTRACT

Individuals with unresolved/disorganized representations of childhood trauma (U/d attachment) report more psychological distress than others, but little is known about their everyday mentation. In the present study adults with childhood trauma (N = 45) completed the Berkeley-Leiden Adult Attachment Questionnaire-Unresolved (BLAAQ-U) and the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), and reported everyday mentation during 5 days of experience sampling. The BLAAQ-U and the AAI showed a medium association with each other, but only the former significantly predicted negative affect, dissociation, and low control/awareness of mentation. Contrary to our predictions, U/d attachment did not significantly predict mind wandering, but the BLAAQ-U predicted endorsements of a negative mind wandering style. U/d attachment, as assessed by both instruments, was associated with the Poor attentional control style and beliefs in anomalous mental phenomena. Experience sampling is a valuable way to investigate everyday experiences in individuals with U/d attachment.

KEYWORDS:

• Disorganized attachment
• mind wandering
• dissociative experiences
• experience sampling
• detachment

Acknowledgment

We would like to thank Marinus van IJzendoorn and the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on a draft of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The appendix includes our post hoc analysis of whether individuals are more likely to experience detachment when thinking about other people (e.g., parents, friends) and whether U/d attachment moderates these associations.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Milton H. Erickson Foundation, the Swedish Society for ClinicalHypnosis (Svenska Föreningen för Klinisk Hypnos).