Linking lack of care in childhood to anxiety disorders in emerging adulthood: the role of attachment styles
Abstract
Background: Emotional neglect can be characterized as cold or critical parenting and denotes a parent intentionally or unintentionally overlooking the signs that a child needs comfort or attention and ignoring its emotional needs. Parental emotional neglect is widely posited as an antecedent of anxiety disorder, with attachment researchers arguing for anxious–ambivalent attachment style as a mediating factor. Method: Childhood experience of neglect and abuse, including antipathy (cold, critical parenting), attachment styles, and anxiety disorders were assessed in a high‐risk sample of 160 adolescents and young adults by means of interview measures. Results: Antipathy was associated with 12‐month prevalence of anxiety disorders in the sample. Anxious–ambivalent attachment scores statistically mediated the relationship between antipathy and anxiety disorders. Conclusions: Clinicians treating anxiety disorders in youths need to consider that emotional neglect in childhood in the form of antipathy could lead to anxious–ambivalent internal working models operating around fear of rejection and fear of separation.
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Persons with a history of emotional abuse and neglect often develop an anxious (preoccupied) attachment style.
“Clinically, persons with a history of emotional abuse and neglect often develop an anxious (preoccupied) attachment style [42–45], characterized by heightened sensitivity to rejection, difficulties with affect regulation, and persistent fears about the availability of close others [21].”
From The link of adverse childhood experiences and attachment to maladaptive personality traits in adults diagnosed with substance use disorder (2025) · cites this paper as [44]
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- Authors
- Schimmenti, A., & Bifulco, A.
- Affiliations
- Università degli Studi di Enna Kore (IT)
- Middlesex University London (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Schimmenti, Adriano
- Venue
- Child and Adolescent Mental Health
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2013-12-09
- Volume
- 20
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 41-48
- ISSN
- 1475-357X (ISSN-L)
- 1475-3588
- OpenAlex
- W2008422676
- Cited by
- 198
- References
- 64
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 15 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 27 · 2021: 17 · 2020: 23 · 2019: 14 · 2018: 23 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 11 · 2015: 13 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 13.35
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Child and Adolescent Mental Health (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Middlesex University Research Repository (Middlesex University Of London) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- UK Medical Research Council (G9827201)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child Abuse and Trauma
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Attachment and Relationship Dynamics
- Keywords
- emotional neglect, anxious-ambivalent attachment, attachment styles, anxiety disorders, emerging adulthood, childhood neglect and abuse, internal working models, fear of rejection, separation anxiety, mediation
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