How Attachment and Brain Development are Linked

What is attachment theory?

Before discussing how attachment theory affects brain development, it is important to define and understand what attachment theory is. This theory explains that based upon a child’s early experiences in life, they form secure or insecure attachments to a parental figure that acts as a kind of secure base or not. When children play tag when they are little, they often run back to home-base where they are safe, and parents very much serve as that safe space to land.

The child who has a secure attachment believes that the world is a safe, organized, and most importantly, predictable place. The child who grows up with an insecure attachment grows up in an environment where things are unpredictable. One day a parent may respond with kindness and love, and one day they may respond with disappointment or anger at the same behavior. Parents may often be invalidating a child’s feelings which results in the child never learning to “trust their gut,” so they go through life looking for crises that have not even happened yet. 

How does this affect the brain?

There are not just emotional, social, and behavioral changes in a child with attachment issues; there are also potential physiological and even structural changes to the brain itself. For example, a child who grows up in a home where they are loved, their needs are met and provides a stimulating environment will have far more synapses or connections. When you think of synapses, picture a large tree. When it comes to our brain and the connections present, we want to have loads of leaves and branches on our trees or synapses.

Conversely, a child who grows up in a deprived environment where their needs are not consistently met will often have fewer leaves and branches on their tree or synapses. We know about synapses because the more synapses we have, the more connections can be made, and the child can become the best version of themselves. Synapses are also linked to intelligence but also longevity of life.

Finally, a child in a deprived or neglectful environment who forms attachment issues may also develop an overactive sympathetic nervous system (SNS), particularly if there is childhood trauma or an adverse childhood experience of some kind (ACE). Our SNS is our fight, flight, or freeze response that lives in our brain and tells us when there is a threat of some kind from which we either need to fight or defend ourselves. In the case of attachment, when children grow up in a home where they are feeling like they are walking on eggshells every day, they grow up with a physiological brain response that responds to the fear of a constant threat that may occur.

Attachments form early in life. However, there is no timetable or deadline for them to occur. Even people with unhealthy or insecure attachments can unlearn old patterns and learn new ways to bond with the people in their lives and ultimately re-wire the existing brain chemistry that formed over time.