Good and stable relationships significantly influence our well-being, because good communication and the feeling of being able to trust strengthen the body and mind of each individual. People who have strong attachments are happier than those who have deficits in attachment skills. This has been proven by many studies. The foundations for human bonding ability are laid very early in childhood.
What is attachment ability?
Good and stable relationships significantly influence our well-being, because good communication and the feeling of being able to trust strengthen the body and mind of each individual. In psychology, bonding ability is the human capacity to enter into long-lasting and emotionally balanced relationships with other people. From the beginning of life, human beings want to go beyond themselves and create connections. But to be able to form lasting bonds, we need a stable personality and a healthy ability to resonate in the emotional realm. The basic neurobiological equipment to develop one’s own bonding ability is present in every human being. Whether the genetic tools provided by nature can also be used depends on the experiences that the person makes in the first years of his life. What is learned early in life can be applied at a later stage: If children have good experiences with other individuals in their environment, they will most likely be able to relate as adults. Modern neurobiology assumes that our genes can only perform their function in interaction with the outside world. Unlike adults, who can shape their own relationships, newborns and children depend on the gift of good relationships. As social beings, humans have a need for contact; loneliness is very stressful for them.
Function and task
If the need for relationships is not sufficiently satisfied, man feels lonely. And the feeling of loneliness is associated with a pain that causes people to become active, to avert isolation. The willingness to work on one’s own relationships is present in a person who is capable of bonding. This is because social behavior brings many benefits: people experience support, security and a sense of belonging in relationships. They receive confirmation and appreciation from others. In addition, trust in another person brings freedom. People who have genuine ties have fewer worries and live more carefree lives, because they know that in an emergency situation there are people they can rely on. A strong network gives serenity and courage – and ensures survival in a crisis. It also means that people are more willing to take on challenges. In many studies, American loneliness researcher John Cacioppo found that people who live without social support have a shorter life expectancy than those with stable relationships. Loneliness is as detrimental to health as obesity, smoking and lack of exercise. But bonding also means work – constantly expanding one’s own ability to bond is a life issue. In order to be able to interpret the signals of the other person appropriately, training in empathic skills is an important key to improved communication. Helpful questions to check your own bonding skills are: Do I find it easy to open up to others? Or do I quickly distance myself because of a fear of closeness? Is it possible for me to talk about feelings or is everything habitually resolved with my own person?
Illnesses and complaints
The way people form their attachments provides information about what they experienced in early childhood and learned from their closest caregivers. If the environment is “healthy,” the child can develop a normal sense of distance and closeness. In cases where positive experiences are largely absent in childhood, the adult’s attachment skills will have difficulty developing. The
reasons for an inability to bond are manifold: If, for example, the parents are distant toward their offspring, the person will have problems showing and living emotional and also physical closeness, because he or she does not know it any other way.Relationship patterns such as “strong striving for harmony with a tendency to avoid arguments” or “a very strong dissociation from the past and parental patterns” are also attributed in psychology – just like the repetition of relationship models from childhood – to difficult situations in the early years of life. Since the ability to bond always means to give the other person (e.g. the partner) his or her space, it is also destructive for a relationship if one part wants to control or – driven by fear of loss – is very jealous. Conceivable and complicated for a relationship is also the case that one partner has never detached himself from his parents and is still dependent on their opinion. But of course, no one is forced to remain in the patterns described. Therapy and coaching can help to discover and redefine one’s own bonding ability and to leave the old patterns behind. A high need for therapy with less prospect of success (with regard to the ability to bind) is present in psychopathological disorders such as schizophrenia, paranoia and borderline personality disorder. Neurodevelopmental disorders such as Asperger syndrome and autism are also characterized by impaired attachment capacity.
