Brown, Daniel P. and and ‘David S.’ Elliott. Attachment Disturbances in Adults: Treatment for Comprehensive Repair. Norton, 2016
- This book is the new “gold standard” reference book for Attachment Theory.
It is not short (30 hours listening time on Audible) but is more manageable if you consider it as three books in one.
Parts 1 & 2 pull together just about everything we know about attachment theory, including new developments!. I thought I was pretty well read on the subject, but I learned a lot.
Part 3 is about repair, and starts with an extremely useful survey of modalities (including AEDP) that address attachment repair, and how they do it. Each modality is explained clearly. Then the authors introduce their own intervention called the Ideal Parent Figure (IPF), a sequence of portrayals which is very precisely designed to facilitate repair. What is most impressive is the hard evidence that this works from AAI measurements before and after.
Part 4 takes in turn each insecurely attached subgroup, and describes what they need from the therapist to gain security. Although this illustrated using the IPF, it can be used within any relational therapy. The book ends with a detailed case history of an extremely disturbed woman, after a dismally failed trauma therapy. Through applying these principles she was able to score “secure” in the AAI and show good evidence of being healed from all her mental illness.
Diana Fosha:
“This is an extraordinary achievement. The must-have book on attachment, it includes everything you need to know about attachment, and then some―history, research, typology AND treatment! Richly comprehensive, precise, and wise, it is honed by real clinical experience, with step-by-step treatment protocols tailored to each attachment classification. This book should be required reading for all graduate students in clinical programs, be they clinical psychology, psychiatry, counseling, or social work. It should be a sine qua non for all attachment researchers. It is a book that any clinician who works with trauma and attachment disturbances―which means all clinicians, for attachment disturbances underlie most major syndromes―should have and master.”
Mooney, Carol Garhart. Theories of Attachment: An Introduction to Bowlby, Ainsworth, Gerber, Brazelton, Kennell, and Klaus. Redleaf, 2008
- Unfortunately the contents of this book do not match the title, unless understood to mean that rather than being an introduction to Attachment Theory, the book covers only a few specific individuals. For example, Mary Main, the pioneer of Adult Attachment Theory does not even get a mention. Nor do any others since.
