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. 2012 Aug;139(3):256-63.
doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2012.01.032. Epub 2012 Mar 2.

The persistence of attachment: complicated grief, threat, and reaction times to the deceased's name

Anthony D Mancini  1 , George A Bonanno
Affiliations

The persistence of attachment: complicated grief, threat, and reaction times to the deceased's name

Anthony D Mancini et al. J Affect Disord. 2012 Aug.

Abstract

Background: Complicated grief is increasingly recognized as a debilitating disorder with significant mental and health consequences. The underlying mechanisms of complicated grief remain unclear, however. In the present study, we investigated a specific mechanism of complicated grief (CG) derived from attachment theory: the accessibility of the deceased's mental representation under threat.

Methods: In a matched comparison of complicated (n=26) and asymptomatic grievers (n=30), we used an emotional Stroop task following subliminal threat or neutral primes to examine the accessibility of mental representations of the deceased, current attachment figures, and close others.

Results: Complicated grievers did not evidence differential accessibility to the deceased's mental representation across priming conditions, whereas asymptomatic grievers showed reduced accessibility (deactivation) of the deceased's mental representation specifically in the threat prime condition. These effects were independent of depressive symptoms. Across grievers, attachment anxiety and avoidance uniquely predicted accessibility of the deceased's name in the threat condition.

Limitations: The limitations of this study are its small sample size and reliance on analog attachment threats.

Conclusions: These data support that accessibility of the deceased's mental representation in threatening contexts is an important component of complicated and asymptomatic grieving and that attachment insecurity contributes to a maladaptive reliance on the deceased as an attachment figure.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Comparing asymptomatic and complicated grievers’ reaction times (RTs) to the deceased name by condition with error bars (95% confidence intervals).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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