Attachment
Are people single because of attachment style or demographics?
Open access · cc by · source: Europe PMC
In a large representative German sample, whether someone was single depended far more on income, age and education than on their attachment style.
Study at a glance
- Design
- Cross-sectional — Representative household survey (random-route sampling) comparing singles and people in relationships on the Adult Attachment Scale, with ANOVAs and a stepwise logistic regression predicting singlehood.
- N
- N=1676 · Analytic subsample of 1,676 adults aged 18-60 drawn from a representative sample of 2,510 German residents (restricted to reduce the influence of widowhood).
- Population
- Representative sample of the German resident population surveyed in 2012; analyses used adults aged 18-60.
- Outcome
- Relationship status (single vs. in a relationship) and Adult Attachment Scale subscales: comfort with closeness, ability to depend on others, and relationship anxiety.
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Key findings
Contrary to an earlier small study, single men were not more anxiously attached than women. Attachment differences depended on age: single people aged 18 to 30 were more comfortable with closeness than coupled peers, while singles aged 46 to 60 were less comfortable with closeness and trusted others less, and singles aged 31 to 45 reported more relationship anxiety. Income below 2000 euros a month was linked to a nearly 13-fold higher likelihood of being single. Overall the model explained 41.1% of the variance in relationship status, with attachment scales adding only about 1% on top of socio-demographic variables.
Methodology
A polling institute surveyed a representative sample of German residents in 2012; the analysis used 1,676 adults aged 18 to 60. Participants reported whether they lived in a relationship and completed the Adult Attachment Scale, which measures comfort with closeness, willingness to depend on others, and anxiety about losing a partner. The authors compared singles and coupled people by gender, age group, education and income, and used a stepwise logistic regression to see how much each set of variables predicted being single.
Limitations
The data are cross-sectional, so the study cannot show whether attachment style leads to singlehood or whether being single (or past break-ups) shapes attachment. It did not record whether people were single by choice, how long they had been single, or their past relationship history, all of which the authors say matter. The attachment questionnaire asks about romantic partners, so singles may look less secure simply because the items fit their situation poorly. Most attachment effects were very small, and several were described by the authors themselves as too small to be relevant despite reaching significance in a large sample.
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