Student-Professor Relationship Styles,Childhood Attachment Bonds and Current Academic Orientations

Abstract

Within the past decade, attachment theory has been productively extended into the domains of close adult relationships. Indeed, a key theoretical construct attachment security has been shown to predict a variety of important relationship out comes, including perceived trust, affect self-regulation, and overall dyadic adjustment. More recently, attachment theory has guided research into non-intimate relationships, again with supportive results. In keeping with this initiative, the present study explored whether college students adopting typically secure vs insecure styles of relating to professors also differed in their descriptions of early attachment bonds with parents, and in their responses to measures of current academic motivation and adjustment. Findings indicated that, relative to their peers with insecure relationship styles, students in secure relationships with their professors experienced significantly warmer and more supportive childhood emotional bonds with their mothers. In addition, they evidenced significantly more favorable academic attitudes and stronger feelings of social integration and connectedness within the university community.