Attachment Histories for People with Characteristics of Self-Defeating Personality

Abstract

Correlations of undergraduates' responses (79 men, 79 women) to the Self-defeating Personality Scale and Gough and Heilbrun's Adjective Check List indicated people who had more characteristics of self-defeating personality were more likely to recall ambivalent and avoidant attachment histories regarding their mothers. There was a tendency for men to recall avoidant attachment histories for fathers as well. These results lend some support to Glickhauf-Hughes and Wells who in 1991 contended being reared in an unpredictable environment by parents who are ambivalent contributes to the development of self-defeating personality. The rs suggest these characteristics are related to cold and rejecting parenting as well.