People, who have an anxious or avoidant (also called dismissing) style of attachment, are also ineffective as parents. Parents with such insecure attachment styles are not the most responsive caregivers. Secure parents, by comparison, are much more attentive to their children’s needs.
It appears that anxious parents either tend to be too authoritarian (controlling or dictatorial) or too permissive (too lax – wanting their children’s approval).
The optimal parenting style involves being authoritative – setting rules and limits, while also attentively responding to a child’s needs in a nurturing way. Secure individuals are much more likely to adopt this optimal style of parenting.
Anxious parents have a difficult time coping with their own emotions, so it should come as no surprise that they have a difficult time attending their children’s needs effectively. Avoidant individual’s tendency to dismiss their own emotions also makes them less responsive when it comes to caregiving.
The full study can be found here.
