Discover Your Attachment Style: A Self-Assessment

Do you worry when your partner does not text you back right away? Do you find yourself obsessed over small shifts in their behavior? Do you find it difficult to express your feelings to loved ones?
Your answers to these questions could give an insight into your attachment style.

Using an Attachment Styles framework can be used to reflect on how you tend to feel and behave in relationships - sometimes in a seemingly uncontrollable way. Knowledge about attachment styles can help you better understand yourself and others, communicate your needs effectively and improve the overall health of your relationship. Consider this assessment as a starting point for your introspection into how you relate with the ideas of love, approval and emotional vulnerability.

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Self-Assessment: Attachment Style

Attachment Styles Explained

Attachment Style Theory suggests that all of us have one of four different attachment styles - Secure, Anxious, Avoidant and Disorganized. Let’s have a brief look at what each attachment style represents:1. Secure attachment style: A balance of intimate connection and independence2. Anxious attachment style: Constantly craving connection and validation, feeling anxious in moments of distance and conflict 3. Avoidant attachment style: Reluctance towards emotional intimacy, avoiding clear communication 4. Disorganized attachment style: Confusion and constant self doubt in relationships, leading extreme love-hate reactions towards partnerAttachment styles are not about fleeting moods and your behavior in specific situations; they’re more deep-rooted and intricate patterns of behavior spanning over different relationships spread across time. Our childhood experiences shape our attachment styles and these continue to influence how we feel and behave in relationships - romantic and otherwise. While you may not have control over which attachment style you developed in your childhood, a better understanding of it would help you build healthier relationships today.

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Uncovering Your Attachment Style

This assessment can be a starting point for deeper self-exploration. You can understand your attachment style by reflecting on your beliefs, emotions and communication patterns. Assessing beliefs - Here we mean your core beliefs about yourself, your partner and love in general. These can be uncovered by analyzing the repetitive, lingering self talk that runs through your head. For eg, the repetitive thoughts of “I can’t stand it when I can’t reach my partner”, could have the core belief of “I need to be in constant touch with my partner to feel okay”. Or “who talks about their feelings all the time?” could mean “I don’t feel safe when I’m emotionally vulnerable”.Tracking emotional cycles - You can start by noticing the common, consistent ways in which you feel and process your feelings in particular situations. How do you usually feel after an argument? - do you crave for instant reassurance from your partner or do you just want to escape the situation and pretend it never happened? Once you identify your emotional patterns, you can do a better job at communicating them or working around them. Analyzing communication patterns - What do you consider as the “normal” frequency of communication with your partner? Do you find yourself constantly wondering what they might be thinking? Important insights about your attachment style can be found by thinking back on how frequently you reach out, what you typically communicate, and how much validation you seek (or avoid).You can use these and similar prompts to reflect on your attachment style. While you do so, remember that this is a generic framework and your experience is unique to your culture, upbringing and people around you. For example, in Indian culture, being open and vulnerable about your emotional needs is a relatively new notion; communicating your needs can often be seen as being “needy” or “weak”. In such cases, emotional restraint in relationships could be a cultural influence and not necessarily an avoidant attachment style. Remember to acknowledge these nuances as you build more awareness.

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Approaches to work on your Attachment Style

1-on-1 Talk Therapy

Explore the roots of your attachment patterns and build healthier relationship dynamics with a therapist who specializes in attachment work.

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Therapist-Led Support Groups

Join one of our support groups, each designed to help you explore how attachment styles shape your emotions, boundaries, and relationships.

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Peer Conversations

Talk to a verified SoulUp Peer who’s worked through similar attachment patterns and can offer honest, lived perspective in a safe, 1-on-1 setting.

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Workshops

Explore our therapist-led workshops focused on emotional regulation, self-awareness and learning practical tools for real-life relationship shifts.

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Unsure how to get started?

Schedule a Discovery Call with one of our in-house therapists to get started with some initial steps and understand what path would work best for you.

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FAQs

How can I tell if my attachment style is influencing my relationship?

The first sign to check if your relationship is influenced by your attachment style could be to see how mindful and intentional you feel about it. Sometimes, you might realize that what you’re doing is not helpful to the relationship, but find it very difficult to stop. Thus, there is a sense of compulsion and loss of control when attachment styles are at play.

How do I know if it’s a genuine connection or an anxious attachment?

When you greatly value the relationship while being confident in your sense of self separate from your relationship, your relationship is not central to all the positive experiences and emotions in your life and if you miss your partner during your time apart without feeling great discomfort, then it’s most likely a genuine connection. The core of secure attachment style is a balanced evaluation of connection and independence.

Why do I feel comfortable initiating romantic relationships yet retreat as they become more intimate?

This pattern can indicate a tension between the desire for intimacy and a sense of insecurity. Early on, you may find connection enjoyable, but when emotional intimacy increases, it may cause unease, anxiety, or the need to distance yourself. Push-pull behavior like this is frequently associated with a disordered attachment style, in which the need for affection and the fear of it coexist. Understanding what your mind connects with intimacy and why, can be explored once you have identified this pattern in yourself.

How do I know if I’m emotionally secure in relationships or just avoiding conflict?

Emotional security is not simply calm on the surface; it feels responsive, open, and stable. It may be conflict avoidance rather than genuine security if you avoid having tough conversations, repress your needs, or convince yourself that "it’s not a big deal" to maintain the peace. You can better comprehend the distinction by considering if your calm comes from a place of trust and security or by avoiding current arguments.

Besides a self-assessment, what are some other tools to analyze attachment styles?

You can use different tools to reflect on your core beliefs, emotional cycles and communication patterns as mentioned in the article. You can journal using prompts like - "today x happened, and I feel ___", "I feel x in such situations because _____", "if I don't get ______, it means I am _____" etc. You can use similar prompts for a real-time voice log instead of journalling.You can also speak with your partner or close friends to reflect on your patterns in the present or past relationships e.g. emotional reactions, conflict responses, and communication habits, etc.