Attachment

The Rosy Path Ahead for Your Attachment Style

New relationship research shows how your attachment styles can change.

Posted August 11, 2026

A basic concept in the field of adult relationships is that it is actually the ones you had as a child which set the stage for your future. According to the theory of attachment styles, you carry with you an inner model of what relationships look like based on how your own parents or other caregivers raised you. If all is well, you’ll be “securely” attached, meaning that you're more likely to feel you can rely on others. If not, you’ll be more likely to struggle with feeling that others might abandon you or fail to deserve your trust.

Betty was raised in a household where she could never feel certain that either parent would provide emotional support. They would often criticize her harshly for failing to meet their standards. At other times, they lavished praise on her and gave her everything she wanted. It’s no wonder that, as an adult, she is constantly testing the people close to her to see which direction the relationship might take.

A Lifespan Approach to Attachment Style

From a lifespan perspective, the issues that Betty is facing could be seen as having the potential to change over time. Although an insecure attachment style could serve as an impossible obstacle, maybe there is hope, given the right circumstances. This is the approach offered by Copenhagen University Hospital’s Sebastian Simonsen and colleagues (2026) in a new study examining age differences in attachment style over the adult years (18-79). With data from nearly 3,600 Danish adults, the authors asked the question of whether there are consistent patterns across older and younger groups.

A secondary but equally important question the authors addressed was whether attachment style would play a role in predicting an individual’s mental health. People with secure attachment should, they predicted, also have higher levels of well-being and lower levels of psychological symptoms. Thus, attachment style’s relationship to age is more than an academic question; it can have practical consequences for people’s levels of depression and anxiety. In part, these associations could reflect the tendency for securely attached people to be in more satisfying relationships.

Measuring Attachment Style Over the Years

It would be ideal if the Danish study used a longitudinal design where the same people were followed over time, but instead, they only had cross-sectional data at their disposal (i.e., comparing different ages). It’s important to keep this in mind when looking at the findings. On the positive side, the sample was large and the data were carried out over two successive periods (2020 and 2021), so that the findings weren’t specific just to one time of testing.

The attachment questionnaire the authors used is a standard instrument in which participants rate whether each of four attachment “prototypes” applies to them or not. They fell into four categories: secure, fearful (afraid of becoming close), dismissive (avoidant and withdrawing), and preoccupied (afraid of being abandoned). The secure attachment prototype read as follows:

It is easy for me to become emotionally close to others. I am comfortable depending on others and having others depend on me. I don’t worry about being alone and having others accept me.

Overall, there was good news in the data in that 65% of the population reported that they were securely attached. This is a figure that is consistent with those emerging from other studies of adult attachment styles, especially in wealthy countries such as Denmark.

Adjusting for such factors as year, marital status, and gender, the findings showed clear improvements across age groups in terms of secure attachment, with 20% more in the 50-59 age group being more likely to report “yes” to the secure attachment prototype. Younger age groups also had higher levels of attachment anxiety as indicated by the preoccupied and fearful categories. The findings also supported the positive association between secure attachment and mental health, as was predicted.

Standing out from these overall positive age trends was the fact that people 70-79 had higher levels of dismissive attachment. Although this could reflect the possibility of some type of cohort effect (i.e., something specific to this group of 70+ people), Simonsen et al. note that this finding is consistent with other cross-sectional research going back as far as 1998.

Let’s pause and look at this finding for the oldest age group, which, again, was not just specific to this study. Overall, across the whole sample, only 14% endorsed the dismissive prototype, so the actual numbers are small. However, the fact that 22% of the oldest group did suggests that there may be challenges older adults face when deciding on whether or how much energy to devote to relationships. It’s also possible that they have lost their spouse or life partner and are now putting their lives back together in the face of this new reality. Unfortunately, adopting a dismissive attachment style could prove to make it more challenging for these older individuals to adapt to that new reality.

Charting Your Own Path Forward

The Simonsen et al. findings are generally quite heartening in that the odds are low for having an insecure attachment style. However, if you are in your young adult years, there is a slightly greater risk that you are experiencing attachment difficulties. That people sail through to their 50s could provide you with some inspiration.

Knowing, though, that a dismissive attachment style characterized one-fifth of the oldest adults in this study, it may be worth considering how you invest your emotional energies as you move through or plan your later years. Attachment figures can take many forms other than a romantic partner. Children, grandchildren, pets, and even people you get to know in your everyday activities (a hair stylist you’re close to) can serve important functions in supporting your mental health. Narrowing the definition of an attachment figure to a romantic partner may be overly limiting and even unrealistic.

To sum up, it’s great to know your chances are good that as you navigate adulthood, you can find and enjoy relationships that are both fulfilling and sustaining.

Read the original article on Psychology Today →