Effects of Adult Attachment on University Students’ Intentions to Seek Help from Friends

Abstract

[Purpose]

Help-seeking is an important strategy for coping with daily stress or concerns. Although many factors either facilitate or inhibit help-seeking, very few studies have focused on personality variables’ impact on help-seeking. This study examined effects of adult attachment on university students’ help-seeking intentions toward friends.

[Methods]

University students (N=455) completed a questionnaire measuring help-seeking intentions, attachment anxiety, attachment avoidance, level of concerns, depression, and support from friends.

[Results]

As the result of structural equation modeling, attachment avoidance showed significant direct negative effect on help-seeking intentions, while attachment anxiety showed no direct effect on help-seeking intentions. Results also showed attachment anxiety’s indirect positive effect on help-seeking intentions mediated by level of concerns and attachment avoidance’s indirect negative effect on help-seeking intentions mediated by friends’ support.

[Discussion/Conclusion]

Proportions of help-seeking explained by attachment were higher than those of previous studies, suggesting that considering attachment is important for understanding why some people are reluctant to seek any help.