COMMENTARY: "How Attached Should We Be to Attachment Theory?

This art icle was downloaded by: [ Wheat on College] On: 22 April 2013, At : 19: 23 Publisher: Rout ledge I nform a Lt d Regist ered in England and Wales Regist ered Num ber: 1072954 Regist ered office: Mort im er House, 37- 41 Mort im er St reet , London W1T 3JH, UK International Journal for the Psychology of Religion Publicat ion det ails, including inst ruct ions for aut hors and subscript ion informat ion: ht t p:/ / www.t andfonline.com/ loi/ hj pr20 COMMENTARY: "How Attached Should We Be to Attachment Theory?" David M. Wulff Version of record first published: 16 Nov 2009. To cite this article: David M. Wulff (2006): COMMENTARY: "How At t ached Should We Be t o At t achment Theory?", Int ernat ional Journal for t he Psychology of Religion, 16:1, 29-36 To link to this article: ht t p:/ / dx.doi.org/ 10.1207/ s15327582ij pr1601_3 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTI CLE Full t erm s and condit ions of use: ht t p: / / www.t andfonline.com / page/ t erm s- and- condit ions This art icle m ay be used for research, t eaching, and privat e st udy purposes. Any subst ant ial or syst em at ic reproduct ion, redist ribut ion, reselling, loan, sub- licensing, syst em at ic supply, or dist ribut ion in any form t o anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warrant y express or im plied or m ake any represent at ion t hat t he cont ent s will be com plet e or accurat e or up t o dat e. The accuracy of any inst ruct ions, form ulae, and drug doses should be independent ly verified wit h prim ary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, act ions, claim s, proceedings, dem and, or cost s or dam ages what soever or howsoever caused arising direct ly or indirect ly in connect ion wit h or arising out of t he use of t his m at erial. THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FOR THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RELIGION, 16(1), 29–36 Copyright © 2006, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. COMMENTARY Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 How Attached Should We Be to Attachment Theory? David M. Wulff Department of Psychology Wheaton College “There is nothing so practical as a good theory.” The authorship of this widely quoted phrase, usually attributed to Kurt Lewin, has recently been disputed, but there is no question that it—or something close to it—has become the mantra of today’s empirical psychologists of religion. Distressed by the “lack of respect” the field receives from mainline psychologists, these proponents of the hypothetical-deductive model argue that what the psychology of religion most needs is more research that is based on well-delineated theories. Attachment theory, with its multidisciplinary roots and carefully developed techniques for operationalizing the varieties of attachment, is proving to be one of the most promising such theories for the psychology of religion. A number of hypotheses about the relation of attachment styles with religiosity variables, especially relation to God, have been supported by empirical data, including some from replications with contrasting populations. Moreover, although general psychology remains largely inhospitable to the psychology of religion, these studies have found their way into major mainline journals (e.g., Granqvist, 2002) and have been summed up in the context of general attachment research (Kirkpatrick, 1999). There is much to celebrate here, as Granqvist (this issue) suggests. Is attachment theory, however, all that Granqvist makes it out to be? More specifically, does it genuinely have one foot in the human sciences and the other in the natural sciences, between which perspectives, then, it moves flexibly? And whether this is the case, is it truly a replacement for the depth approaches, retaining Correspondence concerning this article should be sent to David M. Wulff, Department of Psychology, Wheaton College, Norton, MA 02766. Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 30 WULFF key insights while providing a sounder theoretical foundation (evolutionary psychology), more adequate empirical evidence, and the promise of a more comprehensive account of religion? Let us begin with the broader question: Does attachment theory bridge the natural and the human sciences? It certainly does in Bowlby’s (1969–1980) work. As is well known, Bowlby took psychoanalysis as his starting point, but he then looked for supporting evidence outside of the consultation room, mainly in the domain of ethology. By combining these disparate sources “with an amazing richness of material and thoroughness of investigation,” wrote Strenger (1991), Bowlby “produced one of the most impressive confirmations of some of the central tenets of psychoanalytic object relations theory” (p. 198). Strenger positioned psychoanalysis as a whole somewhere between the extremes of natural science and pure hermeneutics. Anticipating that some of his readers will object to what may seem to be an untoward emphasis on natural-scientific criteria for evaluating psychoanalytic theory, Granqvist cites Main’s (1993) explicit reliance on the hermeneutical principle of coherence in the process of coding responses to the semiclinical Adult Attachment Interview. I could add that Main (1991) refers to the interview transcripts as narratives, and she proposes that they be evaluated according to the criteria of cohesiveness and plausibility as well. Such language does indeed sound familiar to those who advocate qualitative/hermeneutical approaches in psychology. It should be noted, however, that these interpretive principles Main (1991, 1993) applies to the protocols alone, not to the overarching theory or framework. The reflexivity that in qualitative/hermeneutical research is recurringly directed toward the investigator’s own constructions of meaning in the research process appears to be absent. Furthermore, the final reduction of the interview material to a small number of “adult attachment categories” confirms that Main is engaged in “little q” rather than “big Q” qualitative research (Kidder & Fine, 1987). That is to say, instead of the personal and epistemological reflexivity, critical language awareness, and inductive, open-ended research methodologies that mark true qualitative/hermeneutical research today, the attachment research exemplified by Main as well as Granqvist simply uses techniques of nonnumeric data collection as a starting point for carrying out traditional hypothetical-deductive investigations (Willig, 2001). Nevertheless, the collecting and analyzing of extensive interview data, even if intended for nothing more than coding into numeric categories, could provide informal occasions for new insights and realizations. Thus it is regrettable that such rich data have so far not been part of the extension of attachment research into the psychology of religion. Data there are numeric from the beginning, derived from a variety of attachment scales that have been subjected to standard psychometric procedures for assessing and improving their reliability and validity. Even so, especially given some of their correlates, one may wonder what it is that they mea- Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 HOW ATTACHED SHOULD WE BE? 31 sure and, if it is indeed something researchers may call “attachment,” what that means, especially in this context. Derived in large part from observations of rhesus monkeys, the concept of attachment as Bowlby used it denotes the turning of a weaker organism to a stronger, more mature one—usually a parent—for protection in the face of imminent danger (Suomi, 1995). What is sought is physical proximity if not intimate embrace. The temptation is understandably strong, then, to speak of attachment to God, who after all is commonly conceived of as a mother (among Hindus especially) or a father (notably by Christians), a more powerful being to whom one can turn for protection or help. Gestures, too, invite such a construction: The postures and hand movements that accompany prayer worldwide have long been interpreted as testifying to “feelings of powerlessness, dependency, and longing, akin to the small child’s reaching up to the beloved parent for protection and consolation” (Wulff, 1997, p. 540). Given, however, the commonly formidable character of divinity—Rudolf Otto’s (1950) mysterium tremendum—it is often represented in more approachable, human forms, which then become the near objects of attachment. Consider, for example, the 19th-century Christian hymn “Safe in the Arms of Jesus,” according to which Jesus is “my heart’s dear Refuge” where one is “free from the blight of sorrow” and from “doubts and fears.” If not Jesus, then the object may be one of the saints, or—much closer to home—one’s minister, priest, or rabbi and fellow congregants (Johnson, 1979). Yet one must be wary of over-extending attachment in Bowlby’s sense to the religious realm of experience. In his own analysis of prayer gestures, Heiler (1923/1969) concluded that, on the whole, such gestures and bodily attitudes are not expressions of supplication but of greeting—means for sharing in the power of the other or for warding it off. Furthermore, when relationship to divinity is constructed in human relational terms, it is not always as vulnerable child to protective parent. In the bhakti tradition of Hinduism, for example, the devotee may choose among a diversity of ways of relating to divinity—as servant to master, friend to friend, child to parent, parent to child, wife to husband, lover to beloved—or even possess consciousness of identity with or absorption in the divine, with a corresponding loss of the sense of self. The prohibition against images of God in the Islamic tradition, in recognition of the inconceivable greatness and transcendence of God, and the emphasis on utter submission (the meaning of Islam), reflects a divine image with the contours of a powerful, demanding, and yet merciful master whose wrath is to be deeply respected. The Sufis, who represent the mystical strain of Islam, seek to transform this distant relationship into a more personal and loving one. Armstrong’s (1993) history of God in the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions brings home how extremely variable the construction of God has been over the millennia, and how a diversity of other beings, more accessible and human, Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 32 WULFF have served alongside. If in addition we bring to mind the various nontheistic traditions, with their impersonal constructions of transcendent truths, as well as today’s individualistic, tradition-rejecting spirituality, we see just what sort of challenge lies before the psychology of religion. Granqvist is certainly right that Freud takes a narrow view of religion, and that other psychoanalytic thinkers wear blinkers of their own. But taken as a whole, the literature on religion created by the depth psychologists is exceptionally encompassing, as I have sought to illustrate elsewhere (Wulff, 1997). Essential to that breadth are the object relations theorists, in whose company Bowlby belongs. There is no question that attachment theory is contributing in significant ways to the psychology of religion. Yet this theory and its allied methodology cannot serve as a replacement for other depth approaches. As Granqvist acknowledges, attachment theory is more narrowly focused—on a particular type of relationship based on a specific relational motive: protection from danger. Attachment theory is a spatial theory, as Holmes (1995) points out: “Where I am in relation to my loved ones becomes the key issue, rather than what I can do or have done to me” (quoted in Gullestad, 2001, p. 7). By reducing objects to “security supporters,“ argues Gullestad (2001), attachment theory leaves little room for “desire and the object of desire,” just as its notion of internal working models neglects the potential contributions of fantasy and unconscious wishes in the formation of these internal representations. The contribution of conflict to normal human development is likewise neglected, observes Gullestad, and is largely replaced by the notion of deficiency. Attachment theory, in sum, fails “to account for the complexity of human object relations” (Gullestad, 2001, p. 9), including the experience of love. Even among rhesus monkeys, Suomi (1995) points out, the early attachment of infant to mother is not prototypical for subsequent social relationships: “The consistent lesson from the primate literature is that mother–infant attachments are truly different from all other relationships that advanced primates inevitably develop” (p. 192). Of course, attachment theory need not replace psychoanalysis to be of value. As Eagle (1995) suggests, what it most promises is the strengthening of the scientific foundations of psychoanalytic theorizing. Whether evolutionary psychology in particular helps to secure these foundations, as Granqvist maintains it does, is not a question I shall address here, apart from suggesting that it may not. Characterized by paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould (2000) as “Darwinian fundamentalism,” contemporary evolutionary psychology stridently argues for a strict adaptationism that, in Gould’s words, turns “a useful principle into a central dogma with asserted powers for nearly universal explanation” (p. 121). Gould argued that many if not most universal human behaviors are nonadaptive side consequences that have been subsequently co-opted for other functions. Whatever the case may be, Bowlby’s disposition to interpret much of human behavior in terms of its survival value is paralleled by his relative neglect of the individual meaning of the behaviors and experiences associated with attachment, Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 HOW ATTACHED SHOULD WE BE? 33 separation, and loss. Similarly, his emphasis on the literal presence or absence of the mother has preempted adequate attention to their more subtle, emotional equivalents. Thus, unlike other object relations theorists, Bowlby left unexplored the significance of the need for and experience of attachment and other forms of relationship for the development of the human self (Greenberg & Mitchell, 1983, pp. 186–187). To valorize attachment theory for its scientific contributions to psychoanalysis is not to say, however, that the depth psychologies stand or fall depending upon the availability of empirical evidence. Like Strenger (1991), I wish to argue that psychoanalysis is in many respects a hermeneutical enterprise, and to that degree should be explored and evaluated in terms of the human sciences, not the natural ones. The standard, positivist model that Granqvist puts forward, with its operational definitions, internal and external validity, and other nomothetic principles, assumes that there is a truth out there, and that such scientific procedures can help us to know it, objectively. To many psychologists today, this is still an attractive and reassuring model. Unfortunately, however, postmodernism is more than an “intellectual smokescreen”; it reflects a genuine loss of consensus—and a corresponding loss of confidence—regarding fundamental ontological and epistemological issues. What Jones (1991) argued is not that there is no reality—the extreme position of solipsism—but that all accounts of reality are ultimately human constructions, products of human perceptual and cognitive processes that are inevitably and often silently influenced by personal, cultural, and historical factors. The outcome is a pluralism of perspectives, interests, and methods, without a privileged or Archimedean point of view from which to judge and compare them. One need not subscribe to postmodernism to embrace a qualitative/hermeneutical perspective; the foundations for the human sciences were laid well before postmodernism emerged. Nevertheless, it is most likely the more open climate of postmodernism that is permitting, if not also enabling, the reemergence and further development of qualitative methods in psychology. Furthermore, the new literature on such methods and their underlying methodologies is deeply informed by the constructivist perspective, which calls for reflexivity from the beginning to the end of every research undertaking (Willig, 2001). If we take a hermeneutical approach to psychoanalysis, one criterion for its adequacy would be comprehensiveness. The psychology of religion may be said to consist of two great branches: the psychology of religious contents and the psychology of religious persons. Empirical approaches, given their reliance on samples of participants and statistical techniques, are by and large limited to the study of groups of living persons. One of the great strengths of the depth approaches, in contrast, is their capacity to address the vast and diverse arena of religious contents—the creeds, codes, images, objects, rituals, scriptures, architecture, and so on that constitute the religious traditions. Furthermore, given the depth psycholo- Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 34 WULFF gists’ reliance on case studies, they are able to explore religious persons individually and not just as groups, in the past as well as in the present. To address so diverse a realm of phenomena, a theory or interpretive perspective may well have to be complex. The principle of parsimony does not demand simplicity per se, but only that a theory not be unnecessarily complicated. In essence, the principle is applicable only when there are two or more theories addressing the same phenomena with the same degree of adequacy; under these circumstances one can choose the theory that is least complex. Regrettably, psychologists have seldom if ever found themselves in this situation, given especially that different theories typically operate on different phenomena. Parsimonious or not, psychoanalysis on the whole can be said to be the most comprehensive framework for analyzing religion that we presently possess. Comprehensiveness, of course, is but one criterion, but it is a very important one indeed. Attachment theory, I argue in sum, is best thought of as a part—an empirically oriented one—of the psychoanalytic whole, not a candidate for replacing it. Moreover, I urge its proponents, especially those who would apply it to religion, to engage with the hermeneutical tradition more seriously. Given that any psychology of religion worth its salt must be applicable to a diversity of traditions, Eastern as well as Western, I recommend particular attention to the charge that attachment theory is laden with Western values and meaning (Rothbaum, Weisz, Pott, Miyake, & Morelli, 2000). I also find myself pondering two groups of empirical findings. First, persons reporting secure attachments from childhood tend to adopt and retain their parents’ religiosity and seldom experience dramatic fluctuations in it, whereas “insecurely attached” individuals show the opposite trends, including a greater disposition toward spiritual change (Granqvist & Hagekull, 2001). Second, those who report secure attachment to God tend to score high on measures of religious orthodoxy or conservatism (Kirkpatrick, 1999; Rowatt & Kirkpatrick, 2002; Sim & Loh, 2003). In Bowlby’s thinking, the need for attachment is in a dialectical relationship with the need for exploration: Secure dependence provides a basis for exploring the unfamiliar and for depending on oneself (Gullestad, 2001). The fact that security of attachment—to parents or to God—is empirically linked, contrariwise, to a preference for orthodoxy and an apparent disinclination to explore religiously suggests to me that Bowlby’s theory of attachment may not be the most appropriate model here. More than 70 years ago, Vetter and Green (1932) reported that virtually all of the men in their sample of members of the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism could recall the loss through death of someone close to them during their early years; of those who had withdrawn from their religious tradition by the age of 20, half had lost one or both of their parents—at least double the expected rate. One third reported an unhappy childhood or adolescence. In contrast, none in a comparison group of college conservatives re- HOW ATTACHED SHOULD WE BE? 35 ported an unhappy childhood and only 4%, a troubled adolescence. Thus, for most of a century, evidence has been accumulating that one’s early relational experiences have considerable potential for shaping one’s later attitudes—religious, political, and otherwise. What is still in doubt, however, is how best to conceive of that influence. Downloaded by [Wheaton College] at 19:23 22 April 2013 REFERENCES Armstrong, K. (1993). A History of God: The 4,000-year quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. New York: Knopf. Bowlby, J. (1969–1980). Attachment and loss (3 vols.). New York: Basic Books. Eagle, M. (1995). The developmental perspective of attachment and psychoanalytic theory. In S. Goldberg, R. Muir, & J. Kerr (Eds.), Attachment theory: Social, developmental, and clinical perspectives (pp. 123–150). Hillsdale, NJ: The Analytic Press. Gould, S. J. (2000). More things in heaven and earth. In H. Rose & S. Rose (Eds.), Alas, poor Darwin: Arguments against evolutionary psychology (pp. 101–125). New York: Harmony Books. Granqvist, P. (2002). 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