Attachment theory is a robust biopsychosocial model that is developmental and evolutionary based, proposing that human beings develop in relationship. It speaks to both the development of self and self-regulation and the mal/adaptations and disruptions due to stress or trauma that often underlie health presentations as well as the ongoing power of relationships to promote resilience and to heal. It powerfully predicts the stress responses and the coping strategies that arise if a person is not safely and comfortably supported, including both the conscious strategies and unconscious strategies.
It then offers a guide to different recovery pathways and strategies and is a model that can apply to systems and cultures as well as the individual and is conducive to integrated care. An overview of a body of collaborative biopsychosocial research (including work by McLean, Kozlowska and Proctor) will be presented, using the unifying model of Attachment theory for research and integrated care.
Aspects of collective work over a decade of research will be presented including: assessment, formulation and integrated management plans using an attachment framework based on formal and clinical attachment assessments; alleviating novel cardiac risk factors (including Type D personality) with an attachment – based integrated management plan; attachment style and adjustment to burns; attachment state of mind predicting nocebo responses to medication; an attachment model of psychospiritual coping (Attachment to God); attachment and psychotherapy in individuals and couples and early work in other areas.
Attachment theory has been a useful framework for our biopsychosocial research and clinical care. Further research and training in the model are warranted.
