Structure and Measurement Invariance of Adult Romantic Attachment

ABSTRACT

Romantic attachment is a popular theory for explaining affect, cognition, and behavior in romantic contexts. This popularity has led to a surge of self-report measures assessing dimensions of attachment. In this study, we considered the ability of 2 common attachment measures, the Adult Attachment Questionnaire (AAQ) and the Experience in Close Relationships–Revised (ECR–R), to replicate the avoidant and anxious attachment factors. We also determined the degree of measurement invariance across, and mean differences between, genders and single and nonsingle individuals. Both the AAQ (N = 650) and the ECR–R (N = 1,271) successfully distinguished avoidant and attachment factors. The AAQ showed evidence for partial strong measurement invariance, whereas the ECR-R showed strict factorial invariance for both gender and relationship status. Gender differences were detected on both measures in a direction consistent with previous research, with males exhibiting higher levels of avoidant attachment (relative to females) and females exhibiting higher levels of anxious attachment (relative to males). Furthermore, when compared to individuals who were currently single, those in romantic relationships exhibited lower levels of avoidant tendencies. This research aligns with the notion that the AAQ and ECR–R reliably assess similar constructs, across genders and single and nonsingle individuals.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Gian Gonzaga, Heather Setrakian, Jonathan Beber, and eHarmony for collecting and providing the AAQ data used in this study. To obtain use of this AAQ data the first author agreed to not publish research disparaging eHarmony. We believe that these data could not reveal any benefits or harms associated with using eHarmony services. The authors are not affiliated with eHarmony, and believe there is no conflict of interest. The authors would like to thank Daniel J. Ozer for his helpful comments on an earlier version of this article.

Notes

¹ Despite the fact that dimensions of secure, avoidant, and anxious attachment are applicable to both children and adults, it is not the case that there exists absolute stability in these tendencies across the life span (Waters et al., 2000). Thus, a child who exhibits an avoidant attachment style might not necessarily exhibit similar avoidant tendencies later in life, within the context of romantic relations.

² The means were recomputed using only the items with invariant intercepts. The difference in avoidant attachment remained significant (Male M = .25, p = .014) and there remained no significant difference in anxious attachment.

³ We also tested for measurement invariance using a shortened form of the ECR–R presented in Wongpakaran and Wongpakaran (2012). The results were remarkably similar, as this short form also showed the hypothesized two-factor structure as well as strict measurement invariance across men and women and relationship status.