Interactional Cycles
Attachment styles and attachment theory have worked their way into pop psychology in recent months and many people are finding that they identify with various descriptions of attachment. While this can be presented as an individual issue, our attachment informs the way that we see the world and ultimately how we enter into and behave within our relationships. One interaction of attachment and relational systems is called our interactional cycle.
If you read the previous posts on insecure attachment and the ways in which they can manifest in adult behaviors, then this part may make sense to you but you may be wondering how the system comes into play. Let me explain: systems and causality are both circular so “no one behavior simply causes another; rather each is linked in a circular chain to others behaviors” (Johnson 2004). This combination with attachment basically says that our attachment shapes our worldview and how we view security, taken together with the circularity of systems, each of our attachment-tinged responses feed off the responses of the other.
Let’s make this clearer. Let’s take the example of a couple where the wife has an anxious-preoccupied attachment style and the husband has a dismissive-avoidant attachment style. There is an argument where the husband throws out the statement “I just can’t live like this!”, the wife, responding from her anxious-preoccupied lens perceives rejection and a pulling away from the relationship. She then doubles down on ensuring physical closeness and a pleading of “don’t leave me”. This strong show of emotion freaks out the dismissive-avoidant attached husband and he may walk into another room and shut the door, making distance between himself and his wife. The wife then attempts to open the door to maintain the proximity. Each is responding to the other’s show of attachment. This is known as the “attachment dance” (Johnson 2004).
To be even clearer, in the dance described above, the wife can be described as a pursuer and, the husband, a withdrawer. This is not the only interactional cycle, but it is one of the more common combinations. It is also possible to have a pursuer/pursuer or a distancer/distancer interactional cycle. A pursuer/pursuer interaction may look like a couple who are both upset, escalate the argument higher and higher and then cling to one another promising to never fight again. A distancer/distancer interaction may look like an argument that flares up wherein both partners then withdraw (they may go to their separate spaces or simply give one another the silent treatment) for a period of time, and then slowly get back to “normal” while never addressing the situation again. The good news is that this can be changed and shifted to work for you rather than against you! You best bet is to seek out a couples therapist that does Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy. If you’re in Connecticut, New York, or New Jersey, give me a call! I would be happy to help you and your partner renegotiate your interactional cycle and help the responses you give one another take on new meaning!