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Integrating Social Information Processing and Attachment Style Research with Cognitive-behavioral Couple Therapy

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Abstract

The majority of the empirically validated interventions for relational distress focus primarily upon improving behavioral functioning, particularly couples’ communication patterns in conflict situations. However, although communication is highly predictive of relationship distress and later divorce, research on the effectiveness of premarital and marital interventions based on communication training has shown limited results. Therefore, although the skills-based approaches can be effective in treating relational discord and instability, they also often neglect another potentially powerful mechanism in the development of relational distress: the social cognitions and/or schemata regarding relationships that individuals carry into their marriages that stem from negative attachment experiences. Thus, this article describes how blending information gleaned from attachment style research with the body of literature addressing social information processing can enhance current methods for the treatment of relational discord. The existing research on adult romantic attachment styles is placed within a social-cognitive information processing framework and a case study demonstrating the utility of this approach with difficult couples is described.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Elizabeth Sandin Allen and Farrah Hughes for their comments on an earlier draft of this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Tennessee-Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, 37996-0900, USA

    Kristina Coop Gordon & Jennifer A. Christman

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  1. Kristina Coop Gordon
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  2. Jennifer A. Christman
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Correspondence to Kristina Coop Gordon.

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Gordon, K.C., Christman, J.A. Integrating Social Information Processing and Attachment Style Research with Cognitive-behavioral Couple Therapy. J Contemp Psychother 38, 129–138 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10879-008-9084-2

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