Disorganized /

Fearful-Avoidant
Attachment
Your Personal Report
Contents
Who Is The Attachment Project? 01

The Importance of Human

Attachment 02

Understanding Your Scores 03

Profile Disorganized/ Fearful-Avoidant

Disorganized/Fearful-Avoidant is one of the

three insecure attachment styles. 05
How Does Your Attachment Style Develop? 06
Why is secure attachment so important? 08
The Five Conditions for Secure Attachment 09

What can you do? 10

We can help! 11
Thank you for your
interest in The
Attachment Project.
This document outlines your results on the self-report
attachment quiz. Your personal report can be found from
page 4 onwards.

Our Mission
Healing an insecure attachment may take dedication,
patience, and persistence - although this might be
challenging, it is entirely achievable.

Cultivating a secure attachment requires knowledge,

practice, and the ability to reflect on yourself (including your
experiences, relationships, skills and weaknesses, and
beliefs, amongst other factors).

Our mission is to provide you with the necessary insight,

skills, and inspiration so that you can develop a sense of
security and feel safe - both in relationships and on your
own.

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 The Importance of Human Attachment 02

The Importance
of Human
Attachment
Why Attachment?
Human attachment plays an essential role in our survival as babies
as well as in our relationships and overall well-being later in life.

Since our attachment styles are formed so early, we neither

remember much about this stage of development nor do we have
control over it. Therefore, our attachment traits are typically
subconscious and automatic.

As a consequence, we might find ourselves repeating the same

unhealthy patterns - in our relationships with ourselves and with
others - over and over again.

Love & Intimacy

Relationships are a central part of our lives.
After all, we are social beings with an innate
Mental Health &
need to belong. Self-Love
When it comes to love and intimacy, Attachment doesn’t only affect the way
attachment has a huge influence on the way we perceive others and our relationships
we select our partners, communicate with with them; it also affects how we see
them, and act in relationships with them. and feel about ourselves.
For this reason, cultivating attachment Possessing attachment security helps us
security is the key to building and maintaining to feel calm, safe, and able to express
healthy, balanced, and long-lasting our true selves.
partnerships.
It enables us to form a clear idea of
what we want in relationships and
communicate our needs openly. This not
only has a profound impact on our
happiness and fulfillment, but also on
our sense of identity, self-esteem,
autonomy, and purpose in life.

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 Understanding Your Scores 03

Understanding
Your Scores
Tips for
Understanding and
Interpreting Your
Different Attachment
Scores
Our attachment quiz includes a scientifically
developed and validated questionnaire, called In some cases, you might notice that your
the ECR-RS (Experiences in Close Relationships attachment scores for all relationships
- Relationship Structures).* As you might have (caregivers and partner) do not match your
noticed, you answered a set of questions for profile - your general attachment. This,
different relationships; for each of your however, is nothing to be concerned about.
caregivers, partner, and other people in It might be that you exhibit a certain
general. Based on your answers, your scores pattern of attachment towards people you
(anxiety and avoidance scores) for each meet; and yet, in close intimate
relationship were calculated. relationships, you have a different
approach. Or it could be that you have a
On the graphic, you’ll find the estimations of
specific attachment pattern towards your
your attachment to each of your caregivers as
caregivers, but not towards other people in
well as to your partner. Each circle on the
your life.
graphic has the same color as the one in the
results description for the specific relationship The important thing to remember is that
(e.g. Below the graphic, the word “partner” is there is no right or wrong when it comes to
blue, so the circle representing the attachment how you experience your relationships. And
for this relationship is also blue.). there’s nothing wrong with having different
emotional experiences with different people
in your life.

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 Profile

Disorganized/
Fearful-Avoidant
 05

Disorganized/Fearful-
Avoidant is one of the
three insecure
attachment styles.
Please be mindful of the fact that the traits of
the disorganized attachment style are
considered to vacillate between the anxious
and avoidant attachment style traits. This is
because the individual’s situations, mood,
and circumstances often dictate which
dimension of attachment they fall on at a
certain time. Due to a disorganized attacher’s
desire for intimacy and love, and intense fear
of rejection, they often display an
Score General: Anxiety: 4.11 / Avoidance: 4.39
“I hate you/I love you” pattern of behaviors
in relationships. In these situations, the traits
of the anxious and avoidant attachment
You may have a poor sense of self agency.
styles are fighting against each other for
This can result in a difficulty making
manifestation.
decisions/feeling helpless/not establishing
goals in life.
Characteristics of
Within intimate relationships, your desire
Disorganized/Fearful-Avoidant for love and intense fear of rejection can
Attachment Style Are: cause you to act chaotically: On the one
hand you search for affection and
You may vacillate between the traits of approval, yet on the other you may
the anxious and avoidant attachment become jealous and suspicious of your
styles. Thus, depending on your situation, partner's intentions.
you act clingy at times towards a partner,
You desire relationships and love, but
but on other occasions, dismissive and
believe that you are not worthy of it.
aloof. Also, in some cases, you may end
Therefore you have difficulty opening up
up feeling dissociated within your
to, trusting, and bonding with others. Deep
relationships.
down, you believe that a partner will reject
You might exhibit an unpredictable and abandon you.
pattern of behaviors.

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 06

How Does Your

Attachment Style
Develop?
The disorganized attachment style is typically
formed during the formative period in a
child's life - the first eighteen months - as a
response to the child’s relationship with their This pattern creates an internal conflict for
primary caregiver(s). It is thought that this the child: their source of safety is also their
attachment style forms from the child source of fear. Who do they turn to when their
perceiving their source of safety (their world becomes frightening or threatening?
primary caregiver) as “scary” or fearful.
Another possible contributing factor to the
The genesis of this perception of fear is often development of disorganized attachment is
rooted in chaotic, frightened, or frightening when caregivers pass down their own sense
behavior from a caregiver. At times the of loss and trauma to the child through their
caregiver may be frightened of their child and actions. Parenting styles are learned, thus,
their ability to parent effectively, but they caregivers often respond to their child’s needs
may also act frighteningly towards the child. in the same way that their own needs were
Sometimes, this frightening behavior might met. As a result, disorganized caregivers may
be aggressive or threatening towards the feel disconnected from their child. In response
child or other people. In more extreme to this sense of disconnection, the child
circumstances, the caregivers might be attempts to forge a strategy that will ensure
abusive. that their caregiver stays emotionally tuned-
in to them.

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 07

Why is secure
attachment so
important?
Let’s have a look at the five primary
conditions for secure attachment and the
corresponding benefits for self-
development. Your responses from the
self report on the five conditions of secure
attachment will give you an indication of
your early childhood experience from your
earliest childhood memories.

Mom or Caregiver #1 Father or Caregiver #2

Protection: 4 Protection: 2
Attunement: 4 Attunement: 2
Soothing & Reassurance: 3 Soothing & Reassurance: 1
Expressed Delight: 4 Expressed Delight: 1
Encouragement: 3 Encouragement: 1

Average: 3 Average: 1
Result Result

Moderately Insecure Very Insecure

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 08

The Five
Conditions for
Secure Attachment
1. Felt Safety
As a parent, first and foremost, you want
your child to feel protected. If your child
feels protected, they feel safe. For the
infant and toddler, safety means closeness
to the caregiver, as they are the source of
2. Feeling Seen
food, warmth, and protection. Danger
means separation from them, beyond the
and Known/
comfort zone. Attunement
The attuned caregiver is fiercely protective Attuned parents can read their
but not overwhelming, intrusive, or baby’s cues accurately and respond
ignoring. They give their child space and to their needs. Attuned responses
freedom to explore the world, but stay give infants information about the
close enough so that the child has a felt effects of their behavior. Children
sense of safety. learn that when they signal a need,
they can expect a prompt,
When the infant strays too far and
predictable, and accurate response.
becomes frightened, they know that they
The result is a feeling of control over
can run to the caregiver and be enveloped
their lives, starting early on: “I signal
in a warm, protective embrace, secured
that I’m hungry, and I get fed; I
against the world. This conveys a message:
signal that I’m tired, and my mother
"You are safe. You are loved. You are
rocks me to sleep.”
loveable."

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
The Five Conditions for Secure Attachment 09

3. Felt Comfort/
Soothing and
Reassurance 4. Feeling Valued/
The attuned parent’s arms are open and Expressed Delight
inviting. When the child is distressed, the
caregiver reassures and soothes the child Feeling valued begins in infancy and is
back to a calm emotional state. the foundation of healthy self-esteem
development.
Helping the child manage their distress and
frustrations will help them develop an Parents who raise children with healthy
internal model of being soothed and self-esteem repeatedly express their joy
comforted. Over time, the child will develop about who the child is rather than what
the ability to manage their own distress and the child does. They focus on Being
self-soothing. rather than Doing. Such parents exhibit
“expressed delight” to the child and
about almost everything the child does.
They focus on the joys of parenting, not
the chores.

5. Felt Support
for Best Self
Children need to feel supported and encouraged to
explore their world joyfully and safely. Special Thanks to R. Chris
Frayley from the University
Parents who champion this have a deep faith in their
of Illinois for making the
child and always provide them with a safety net. use of this test possible and
Deeply involved in their child’s life, parents give the for his contribution to the
child space and thrust them towards autonomy and Attachment field.
independence. This sense of security allows the child
to explore, discover, succeed, and fail; and through
such exploration, the child develops a good,
autonomous, strong, and unique sense of self.

1) The Experiences in Close Relationships-Revised (ECR-R) questionnaire is a revised version of Brennan, Clark,
and Shaver's (1998) Experiences in Close Relationships (ECR) questionnaire. The items on the ECR-R were
selected using techniques based on Item Response Theory, but were selected from the same item pool as those
from the ECR. Both the ECR and the ECR-R are designed to assess individual differences with respect to
attachment-related anxiety (i.e., the extent to which people are insecure vs. secure about the availability and
responsiveness of romantic partners) and attachment-related avoidance (i.e., the extent to which people are
uncomfortable being close to others vs. secure depending on others).

Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 10

What can you do?

By now, you may more concretely suspect
whether the self-assessment test was right
and that you might have a disorganized One way to start healing is by working with
attachment style. a psychotherapist. A therapist is someone
you can trust, as he or she will offer a non-
One of the key issues in people with judgmental, accepting, calm, and
disorganized attachment style is fear of predictable space for you to open up. You
someone they trust hurting them. The easiest might be able to express and make sense
solution? Do not trust anyone. This, however, of your experiences, emotions, and needs
is not a very productive or fruitful solution. in a safe environment.

Simply avoiding proximity will not heal the Although we promote therapy, another
trauma or painful childhood experiences. In option you could consider is trying to heal
order to learn how to build secure on your own. This could be a promising
relationships, you need to learn to trust early approach, as it does not overly push
people first. your limits: It does not require trusting a
stranger right away.
 11

We can help!
We know that having a disorganized attachment style can be difficult: It
can be stressful, confusing, and overwhelming to experience constant
instability in your relationships, feelings, thoughts, and behaviors.

But there’s no need to feel trapped or hopeless - we’ve got your back!
Below, we’ve outlined a series of steps you can take on your journey
towards cultivating attachment security.

The Path to Cultivating

Secure Attachment

View our
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Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant
 ATTACHMENT STYLE REPORT | COPYRIGHT 2020-2025
MINDONLY PTY LTD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Special thanks to R. Chris Frayley from the University of Illinois for making the use of this test possible and for his contribution to the
attachment field. This test is used with permission from R. Chris Fraley from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Source (ECR-RS): Fraley, R. C., Heffernan, M. E., Vicary, A. M., & Brumbaugh, C. C. (2011). The Experiences in Close Relationships—Relationship
Structures questionnaire: A method for assessing attachment orientations across relationships. Psychological Assessment, 23, 615–625.
Further Sources: Ainsworth, M. S. (1989). Attachments beyond infancy. American Psychologist, 44(4), 709-716.
Bowlby J. (1982). Attachment and Loss: Volume 1 Attachment. 2nd ed. New York: Basic Books.
Mikulincer, M., Shaver, P.R. (2007). Attachment in Adulthood: Structure, Dynamics, and Change. Guilford Press.