Investigating the Effects of Endurance of Marriage on the Relationship between Attachment and Love Style

Married individuals, like all other adults use the attachment styles they developed in childhood as part of their framework for how they experience loving relationships. Love can be experienced as commitment, passion, or intimacy or any combination of those styles. The degree of attachment related anxiety or avoidance a married person has can influence how they perceive the experience of different love styles in their close relationships. The present study aimed to evaluate how attachment style influences love style in a sample of married adults (N= 248). Participants ranged in age from 23 to 69 (M=38.6) and were predominantly female (93.1%) and graduate degree holders (61.7%). Most participants had been married 15 years or less (70.2%). This sample consisted of married adult staff and faculty surveyed at a small private university in the Northwest United States as well as married adults recruited on social media websites. In addition to examining the effect of adult attachment on love style, the study also evaluated the moderating effects of length of marriage. This moderator was included in order to provide a better understanding of a potential mechanism for fostering or inhibiting love, and to identify a possible point for intervention. Results indicate that low levels of attachment related anxiety are significantly predictive of high levels of intimacy (r=-.53, p \u3c .001), passion (r=-.41, p \u3c .001), and commitment (r=-.413, p \u3c .001). Results further indicate that low levels of attachment related avoidance are significantly predictive of high levels of intimacy (r=-.64, p \u3c .001), passion (r=-.56, p \u3c .001), and commitment (r=-.51, p \u3c .001). The length of marriage was the only significant moderator of the relationship between attachment-related avoidance and a passion love style (b=13.080, t [231] =-7.428, p \u3c0.001) suggesting avoidance is more detrimental to the passion of those married 16 years or more compared to those married 15 years or less. These results highlight the importance of assessing for attachment related anxiety and avoidance in married individuals who may be suffering from deficits in one or more domain of love and that this assessment and related intervention may look similar for both newlyweds and those whose marriages have endured more tests of time

Mindful marriage: Exploring the interaction between mindfulness and length of marriage

The purpose of this study was to explore the interaction between length of marriage and trait mindfulness on marital satisfaction. Although previous research has demonstrated that both length of marriage and trait mindfulness positively predict marital satisfaction, research has yet to explore the interaction between the two. Thus, our study adds to the existing literature by exploring the relationship between length of marriage and marital satisfaction, moderated by mindfulness. Because mindfulness has been shown to both act as a buffer against stress and to have a positive relationship with marital satisfaction, we hypothesized that trait mindfulness would moderate the relationship between length of marriage and marital satisfaction. More specifically, we hypothesized that (a) length of marriage would positively predict marital satisfaction, and (b) mindfulness would moderate this relationship, such that those in short-term marriages who are high in trait mindfulness will demonstrate higher marital satisfaction than those in both long and short-term marriages with low trait mindfulness. Participants (N = 331) indicated how long they had been married and then completed measures of mindfulness (FFMQ-SF) and marital satisfaction (KMSS). Results indicated that neither trait mindfulness nor length of marriage predicted marital satisfaction. Moreover, contrary to our hypothesis, the interaction between length of marriage and trait mindfulness was also nonsignificant. Follow-up analyses indicated significant differences in trait mindfulness, but not marital satisfaction between groups. Limitations of the current study and implications for future research in this area are discussed

Sand fly synthetic sex-aggregation pheromone co-located with insecticide reduces the incidence of infection in the canine reservoir of visceral leishmaniasis: a stratified cluster randomised trial

The predominant sand fly vector of the intracellular parasite Leishmania infantum, that causes human and canine visceral leishmaniasis in the Americas, is Lutzomyia longipalpis. Dogs are the proven reservoir. Vector control tools to reduce transmission suited to this predominantly exophilic vector are lacking. Insecticide-impregnated dog collars protect dogs against infectious bites from sand fly vectors, and result in reductions of new infections in both dogs and humans. However, collars are costly for endemic communities, and alternative approaches are needed. Recently the bulk synthesised sex-aggregation pheromone of male Lu. longipalpis was shown to attract large numbers of conspecific females to lethal pyrethroid insecticides, indicating the potential for use in a vector control application. This study, conducted in Brazil, evaluated the efficacy of this novel lure-and-kill approach to reduce seroconversion and infection incidence with L. infantum in the canine reservoir, in addition to measuring its impact on household abundance of Lu. longipalpis. Deployed in 14 stratified clusters, the outcomes were compared to those attributed to insecticide impregnated collars fitted to dogs in another 14 clusters; each intervention was compared to 14 clusters that received placebo treatments. The beneficial effects of the lure-and-kill method were most noticeable on confirmed infection incidence and clinical parasite loads, and in reducing sand fly abundance. The overall effect of the two interventions were not statistically dissimilar, though the confidence intervals were broad. We conclude that the novel low-cost lure-and-kill approach should be added to the vector control toolbox against visceral leishmaniasis in the Americas

Integrating social interest and attachment based couples therapy

This poster describes the potential benefit of incorporating interventions that target concern for and involvement with the wider community into an existing framework for attachment-based couple\u27s therapy. Secure attachment, as cultivated through Emotion focused therapy (EFT) allows for healthy exploratory behaviors that venture beyond the secure base into the wider context. The authors propose the Adlerian construct of social interest, meaning engagement with the well-being of a wider community, as a pro-social outcome of such exploration, which in turn strengthens the dyadic relationship by developing a sense of shared purpose that is attuned, focused, and collaborative