ABSTRACT
In 1985, Mary Main, along with her colleagues, revolutionized the study of attachment when they devised a measure called the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Thus, Main returned to her first interest, the study of language, and the stage was set for the Adult Attachment Interview, a measure that continues to be one of the best ways of evaluating adult state of mind with respect to attachment. The AAI is a structured, 20-question, semi-clinical interview that focuses on an individual's early attachment-related experiences and the resulting perceived effects. In the initial Berkeley Longitudinal Study, 48% of parents were classified as secure, 39% as dismissing, and 13% as preoccupied. When examining the distribution while including the unresolved category, of the 889 nonclinical mothers, 55.2% were secure, 19.6% dismissing, 10.4% preoccupied, and 14.9% unresolved. In clinical populations, only 27% of the sample were deemed secure, 35% were found to be dismissing, and 38% were preoccupied.
