Attachment as resource and risk management strategies

Attachment is conceptualized as life history strategies in response to two sets of environmental conditions that are mediated and embodied by caregiving and caregivers. The two environmental sets are Resources relative to population density and competition and extrinsic Risk levels and stochastic variations also known as mortality and mobility. Calibrated based on these two environmental conditions early in life, attachment styles are related to resource and risk management strategies later in life. Resource includes external or material resources as well as internal or bioenergy. Within this life history framework, two studies based on 169 Chinese adults and 81 Chinese children, respectively, were conducted to test and to have partially supported the hypothesis that attachment anxious ambivalence was associated with health concerns and body energetic conservation, conservative spending, and risk aversion, and that attachment avoidance was associated with high spending and squandering and impulsivity and risk taking.