Explaining the Impact of Attachment Style on Evaluations of Supportive Messages: A Dual-Process Framework

Abstract

This article reports tests of hypotheses derived from a theory of supportive message outcomes that maintains that the effects of supportive messages are moderated by factors influencing the motivation and ability to process these messages. Participants ( N = 331) completed measures of attachment style, which provided individual-level assessments of processing motivation, and responded to either a mildly or moderately severe problem, which manipulated situational motivation.They subsequently evaluated the helpfulness of comforting messages that varied in person centeredness and were attributed to either an acquaintance or a close friend. Although message evaluations were strongly influenced by person centeredness, this effect, as expected, was also moderated by attachment style and problem severity. Results are discussed in terms of the dual-process theory of supportive message outcomes.

Communication Channel, Sex, and the Immediate and Longitudinal Outcomes of Verbal Person-centered Support

“…These studies informed the adaptation of dual-process models of persuasion to account for the influence of supportive communication on recipients (Bodie & Burleson, 2008;Bodie et al, 2011;Burleson, 2009). The dual-process approach suggests that message content has its strongest effect on outcomes when receivers engage in in-depth message processing, and it recognizes that support receivers use their cognitive resources to process messages thoroughly only when they are able and motivated to do so (Bodie, 2011).…”

“…As noted previously, the majority of studies of VPC support messages have examined people's immediate perceptions of messages (see Bodie et al, 2011;Burleson, 2008;Jones & Burleson, 1997) or improvement in affect after exposure to comforting messages (Jones, 2004;Jones & Burleson, 2003). Two studies that did examine over-time effects of support conveyed in a conversation investigated a time frame of less than one hour.…”

Person-Centered Emotional Support and Gender Attributions in Computer-Mediated Communication

“…Pretests were conducted in order to (a) ensure that HPC messages were perceived as more person‐centered than LPC messages and (b) verify that the support exchange situation was relatively low in severity. The rationale for a less severe situation is that lower‐severity problems are less likely to prompt central processing of support messages, elevating the influence of heuristic (source) qualities in message processing (e.g., see Bodie et al, ; Burleson, , Study 3). Because this research was interested in the effects of overt heuristic cues, a situation in which such cues were important provided a more useful test of hypotheses.…”

The Interactive Role of Emotional Intelligence, Attachment Style, and Resilience in the Prediction of Time Perception in Doctoral Students

“…Four categories of attachment styles have been described by the literature: secure, avoidant, ambivalent or resistant, and disorganized (Berlin et al, 2008;Bodie et al, 2011). Infants with a secure attachment style tend to believe that their needs will be met and are generally happy, secure, and explorative at baseline.…”

“…Individuals who have experienced past negative events, which they find difficult to decathect, may have developed an anxiety attachment style as a result of these negative or traumatic events. Anxiety attachment style in adults is usually characterized by difficulty with the ability to trust people, fear of abandonment and disappointment, difficulty with the ability to be alone, fear of the loss of a love object, and fear of death and annihilation (Bodie et al, 2011;Bowlby, 1979;Thompson, 2008). Zimbardo and Boyd (1999) found that individuals with past-negative time perspectives had unsatisfactory and minimal interpersonal relationships and reported having fewer close friendships as compared to those with other time perspectives.…”