This study aimed to examine the relationship between parental attachment, peer attachments, and automatic thoughts with adolescent mindfulness skills in Iranian adolescents, drawing on internal working models and social cognitive theory. The data was collected from a sample of Iranian adolescents in Tehran using standardized measurement instruments previously developed by researchers. The collected data was analyzed using both simple and multiple regression analyses. The results revealed a positive and significant association between parental attachment and peer attachments with adolescent mindfulness skills. Conversely, automatic thoughts were found to have a negative impact on adolescent mindfulness skills. These findings suggest that strengthening attachments can contribute to the enhancement of mindfulness skills in adolescents, while addressing automatic thoughts is crucial in preventing the erosion of mindfulness skills. Consequently, experts can design interventions that focus on improving attachments and addressing automatic thoughts to promote adolescent mindfulness skills.

Infants’ difficulty, typically characterized as proneness to negative emotionality, is commonly considered a risk for future maladaptive developmental trajectories, mostly because it often foreshadows increased parental power assertion, typically linked to future negative child outcomes. However, growing evidence of divergent developmental paths that unfold from infant difficulty has invigorated research on causes of such multifinality. Kochanska et al. (2019) proposed that parent and child Internal Working Models (IWMs) of each other are key, with the parent’s IWM of the child moderating the link between child difficulty and parental power assertion, and the child’s IWM of the parent moderating the link between power assertion and child outcomes. In Children and Parents Study (200 community mothers, fathers, and children), child difficulty was observed at 8 months, parents’ power assertion at 16 months, and children’s outcomes rated by parents at age 3. Parents’ IWMs were assessed with a mentalization measure at 8 months and children’s IWMs were coded from semi-projective narratives at age 3. The cascade from infant difficulty to maternal power assertion to negative child outcomes was present only when both the mother’s and the child’s IWMs of each other were negative. We did not support the model for father-child dyads.

Children’s relationships inform their internal working models (IWMs) of the world around them. Attachment and emotional security theory (EST) emphasize the importance of parent–child and interparental relationships, respectively, for IWM. The current study examined (a) data-driven classes in child attachment and emotional security IWM, (b) associations between IWM classes and demographic variables, maltreatment, intimate partner violence (IPV), and maternal depressive symptoms, and (c) consistency in attachment and emotional security IWM classes, including as a function of maltreatment, IPV, and maternal depressive symptoms. Participants were 234 preschool-aged children (n = 152 experienced maltreatment and n = 82 had not experienced maltreatment) and their mothers. Children participated in a narrative-based assessment of IWM. Mothers reported demographics, IPV, and maternal depressive symptoms. Latent class analyses revealed three attachment IWM classes and three emotional security IWM classes. Maltreatment was associated with lower likelihood of being in the secure attachment class and elevated likelihood of being in the insecure dysregulated attachment class. Inconsistencies in classification across attachment and emotional security IWM classes were related to maltreatment, IPV, and maternal depressive symptoms. The current study juxtaposes attachment and EST and provides insight into impacts of family adversity on children’s IWM across different family relationships.

Extrinsic mortality risks calibrating fast life history (LH) represent a species-general principle that applies to almost all animals including humans. However, empirical research also finds exceptions to the LH principle. The present study proposes a maternal socialization hypothesis, whereby we argue that the more human-relevant attachment system adds to the LH principle by up- and down-regulating environmental harshness and unpredictability and their calibration of LH strategies. Based on a longitudinal sample of 259 rural Chinese adolescents and their primary caregivers, the results support the statistical moderating effect of caregiver–child attachment on the relation between childhood environmental adversities (harshness and unpredictability) and LH strategies. Our theorizing and findings point to an additional mechanism likely involved in the organization and possibly the slowdown of human LH.

Difficult infants are commonly considered at risk for maladaptive developmental cascades, but evidence is mixed, prompting efforts to elucidate moderators of effects of difficulty. We examined features of parents’ representations of their infants – adaptive (appropriate mind-mindedness, MM) and dysfunctional (low reflective functioning, RF, hostile attributions) – as potential moderators. In Family Study (N = 102), we tested parents’ appropriate MM comments to their infants as moderating a path from infants’ observed difficulty (negative affect, unresponsiveness) to parents’ observed power assertion at ages 2–4.5 to children's observed and parent-rated (dis)regard for conduct rules at age 5.5. In father–child relationships, MM moderated that path: for fathers with low MM, the infants’ increasing difficulty was associated with fathers’ greater power assertion, which in turn was associated with children's more disregard for rules. The path was absent for fathers with average or high MM. In Children and Parents Study (N = 200), dysfunctional representations (low RF, hostile attributions) moderated the link between child objective difficulty, observed as anger in laboratory episodes, and difficulty as described by the parent. Reports of mothers with highly dysfunctional representations were unrelated to children's observed anger. Reports of mothers with average or low dysfunctional representations aligned with laboratory observations.

This study examined the relationship between attachment styles and subjective well-being in late adulthood. Seventy-six elderly adults (mean age = 67.9 years) completed the Relationship Questionnaire (a measure of attachment styles), the MUNSH (a measure of subjective well-being) and ratings of perceived health and marital status. Results indicated that both health and attachment style produced significant main effects, but no interaction, on well-being. Specifically, healthy individuals were happier than unhealthy ones; participants with secure and dismissive attachment styles were significantly happier than those classified as fearful. The distribution of attachment style classification across secure, preoccupied, fearful, and dismissive styles showed differences compared to previous research with younger adults.