Relations Between the Individual and Joint Attachment Scripts in Couples with a Child with Autism

Background:  The attachment theory posits that having a secure attachment in infancy may influence the quality of couples’s relationship later in life. The individual attachment script is a cognitive structure which reflects the quality of experiences between a person and their caregivers since childhood. In adulthood, the joint attachment script reflects both the individual script and that built by a couple in their relationship. The ability to trust and to both support and be supported by the partner is specially important when the couple faces difficulties such as having a child with autism. Therefore, the need of a mutual support may be facilitated by the presence of a history of both individual secure attachment (with the caregivers) and joint secure attachment (with a partner).

Objectives:  This study has investigated if a couple who has an individual script of secure attachment also has indicators of a secure joint attachment.

Methods:  Three couples whose child has autism participated in the study. The individual attachment script was assessed by the Attachment Script Assessment – ASA, which identify if the subject has or not an access to a secure script. The couple’s attachment script was accessed by a semi-structured interview which was analyzed by content analysis. The assessment was conducted by two independent coders. The coders who assessed the interview were blind to the results of the ASA. The qualitative analyses of the interview generated the following categories: Task divisions between the couple, Situations of support and solidarity, Dissonance and antagonism, Individual characteristics (or features), Perception of the child, Conjugality and Social network.

Results:  Main results showed that each couple had a different pattern of individual secure attachment. In one couple both partners had access to the secure attachment script; in the other, only one had this access to a secure attachment script; in the third one, both partners did not have the access to the secure script. The couples in which at least one member had  access to the individual secure attachment script  also tended to present indicators of joint attachment script, such as sense of a fair task division, empathy and ability to manage conflicts and to seek social support in and outside the family. Regardless the fact of having or not access to a secure attachment script, the three couples reported difficulties in their marital life, especially lack of intimacy. Finally, all couples reported a poor family support network. Their main support was their other children, although the couples with more joint attachment indicators tended to seek the professional network more often.

Conclusions:  The results point to the potential relationship between individual and joint attachment script, leading to a promising area of studies and intervention with the parents that have a child with autism.