Love, Trust, and Evolution: Nurturance/Love and Trust as Two Independent Attachment Systems Underlying Intimate Relationships

Abstract

Research has indicated two dimensions of attachment, Avoidance and Anxiety. We show that Avoidance is better conceptualized as Nurturance/Love within an evolved systems perspective on personality, and that the Anxiety dimension in infancy measures trust in the face of threat based on experience. These two dimensions have important differences, including different evolutionary functions and phylogeny, as well as different emotions, brain mechanisms, and patterns of sex differences and heritability. We used two versions of the Experiences in Close Relationships Survey yielding measures of Anxiety and Avoidance, and the Interpersonal Adjective Scale-Revised-Big 5, the latter chosen because it measures Nurturance/Love in a manner consistent with an evolutionary perspective on close relationships. 635 subjects participated in the study. Results supported the hypotheses of a strong negative association between Nurturance/Love and Avoidance as measured by the ECR and no association between Nurturance/Love and Anxiety as measured by the ECR.