Integrating the relationship between attachment strategies and self-regulation among university students in Lebanon : a correlational study

Abstract

Research on self-regulation has flourished in recent years given its fundamental significance in fostering adjusted psychological, social, physical and academic human functioning. Self-regulation is defined as one’s ability to flexibly adapt one’s behavior, attention, emotions and cognitive strategies in response to internal cues, environmental stimuli and feedback from others. As theorists have asserted the relation between attachment strategies and self-regulation, this study aims at assessing this relation from a cultural perspective. The research sample comprised 223 male and female university students, aged between 19 and 27 years old and holding the Lebanese nationality. ASRI and CaMIR tools were administered to explore participants self-regulatory capacities and attachment strategies, respectively. Results indicated that the most privileged attachment strategy among the research sample is secure-distanciation attachment. With regard to the relation between attachment strategies and self-regulation, both secure distanciation and secure interdependence attachment strategies were positively correlated with self-regulation. Additionally, a regression analysis indicated that while both secure attachment strategies predict self-regulation, secure distanciation attachment predicted self-regulation stronger.