Mothering styles can predict adult relationships, study says

Anxious about the stability of your relationship with your romantic partner? Uncomfortable relying on a friend?. It could be because of how your mother treated you as a toddler, reports a new Cornell study that finds that such treatment can predict your experiences in these adult relationships. That's the finding of Vivian Zayas '94, assistant professor of psychology, whose study is published online by Social Psychological and Personality Science. "It was assumed that differences in adult attachment - how people experience their relationships in adulthood, especially with romantic partners - was rooted in their experience with their primary caregiver early on in life, typically one's mother," Zayas said. Yet no long-term longitudinal work had looked at whether early life maternal experiences were in fact related to attachment behaviors with romantic partners and friends in adulthood. Zayas studied 36 young adults, who were all about 22 years old and had been studied as 18-month-olds with their mothers; the toddlers and their mothers had been closely observed for facial expressions, displays of affection, and other measures during free play. Zayas explored their relationships in adulthood two decades later.