Abstract

The purpose of the study is to investigate how childhood attachment and autonomy explain the gender differences in adulthood heterosexual love styles. The study examines (1) the gender differences in childhood attachment and autonomy and adulthood heterosexual love relationships, (2) the relationship between childhood attachment and autonomy in relation to mother, and love styles in adulthood among men and women. 405 married or unmarried men and women participated in a questionnaire study. Such statistic analyses are engaged for this study as cross-tabulation analysis, and one-way ANOVA. The key findings of the study are that the relationships of childhood developmental pattern of attachment and autonomy to adulthood heterosexual love styles differ between men and women. That is, developmental patterns of childhood attachment and autonomy to mother operate as a vulnerability factor in establishing adulthood love relationship, whereas childhood experiences do not explain adulthood love among women. These gender differences are discussed in theoretical contexts which explain gender-differentiated process of separation from mother during childhood.

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