Associations of Self-Esteem With Attachment to Parents: A Meta-Analysis

The main objective of the present meta-analysis was to analyze associations between security of attachment to parents and self-esteem. Studies were included if they assessed bivariate associations between self-esteem and attachment security with mothers and/or fathers, or with both parents in general. A systematic search in the electronic databases PSYCINFO, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and PSYNDEX identified 202 studies with 81,485 participants that were included in this multilevel meta-analysis. Criteria from the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool were used for assessing the quality of the individual studies. Most studies assessed security with verbal measures (190 studies), and the mean age of participants was 16.5 years. We found a moderate positive concurrent correlation of attachment security to parents with self-esteem (r = .34; 95% confidence interval [CI], .33-.36), with associations being stronger when assessing attachment to parents in general (r = .37; CI, .35 to .40) rather than to mothers (r = .33; CI, .31 to .35) or fathers (r = .32; CI, .30 to .34) in particular. Cross-lagged effects indicate that higher initial attachment security predicts an increase in self-esteem over time (r = .19; CI, .09 to .28), while initial self-esteem predicts change in security (r = .08; CI, .02 to .14). Correlations of attachment security with self-esteem were weaker in older participants and stronger in studies with validated attachment measures. As most of the included studies have been conducted with adolescents and young adults, knowledge about associations of secure attachment to parents and self-esteem in the first years of life is still limited. Nonetheless, it is concluded that the available results support suggestions of attachment theory on the role of secure attachment for self-esteem, although causal effects could only be tested in experimental studies.