An attachment perspective on resilience to stress and trauma

Attachment theory has been one of the most useful contemporary conceptual frameworks for understanding emotion regulation and mental health. In his exposition of the theory, John Bowlby (1973, 1980, 1982) explained why the availability of caring, supportive relationship partners, beginning in infancy, is so important to developing a sense of safety and security. This sense supports effective distress management and facilitates psychological wellbeing during times of stress or crisis. In this chapter, we review research on attachmentrelated processes in adolescence and adulthood that has consistently shown that attachment security is a resilience resource in times of distress. We also review empirical studies that show how individual differences in attachment security and insecurity shape psychological and physiological reactions to attachment-related and attachment-unrelated stressful and traumatic events.