The relationship between Secure attachment and Empathy.

Abstract

Prior research shows that secure attachment relations with parents, is related to successful attachment relationships from childhood and succeeding into adulthood. An important capacity for the formation and maintenance of successful relationships in empathy. This study investigated the hypothesis that higher levels of attachment security are associated with higher levels of empathy. In this online study, one hundred participants completed 2 questionnaires, the first questionnaire was the ECR-RS questionnaire, which was used as a measure of adult attachment style. The second questionnaire was the Empathy Quotient (EQ) , which was used as a measure of empathy. A significant negative correlation was found between attachment related anxiety and empathy and between attachment related avoidance and empathy. Further, findings from regression analyses showed that attachment related avoidance attributed for 28% of the variance in empathy scores. Attachment related anxiety accounted for 16% of variance of empathy scores. Findings support the view that attachment security relations are associated with higher levels of empathy