Should I Stay Or Go: A Guide To Working with The Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style Workshop with Ana Lund

This is the THIRD workshop in a series entitled “The Social Neuroscience Of Adult Attachment: The How-To Guide For Therapy”. This series combines the modern neuroscience perspective on human attachment with practical strategies for working effectively with adult attachment styles in therapy.

By interweaving the concepts of neuroanatomy, brain chemistry, and the evolution of species, we will paint a picture of how human attachment came into being as a biological mechanism according to the view of contemporary social neuroscience.

We will explore the relationship between the modern neuroscience of attachment and classic attachment theory. We might even explore some tentative links between different attachment styles and the four personality brain-system-based types proposed by Dr Helen Fisher.

Despite the complex nature of the topic, the workshop will be hands-on and use a detailed case study to illustrate these complicated concepts, providing you with a set of neuroscience-informed tools to better facilitate work with clients who wish to understand or adjust their attachment style. Throughout, we will clarify and simplify some confusing and redundant vocabulary around attachment themes and indulge in some myth-busting.

You will have ample opportunity to reflect on your own experiences, including a dedicated session to bring questions or case studies and share them with the group.

Part I: Becoming a Unicorn: Neuroscience Guide to Avoidant Attachment Style (May 2024) BOOK HERE

Part II: Lovefool: Neuroscience Guide to Anxious Attachment Style (June 2024) BOOK HERE

Part III: Should I Stay Or Should I Go: A Guide To Working With The Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style (July 2024)

Part IV: AMAA: Ask Me Anything Attachment (And Bring Your Own Case Study) (August 2024) BOOK HERE

In “Should I Stay Or Should I Go: A Guide To Working With The Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style” we will focus on how to understand and work effectively with this presentation that can sometimes be at high risk.

No previous knowledge of neuroscience or attachment theory is required in order to participate, curiosity about the topic is all you need. This workshop will provide you with tools and insights that you can immediately apply to your own practice.

Each workshop will be self-contained, so you can attend all the sessions or a single event as a stand-alone session.

Learning Objective Participants Can Expect From This Event

• Become familiar with the basic tenets of modern neuroscience model of human attachment
• Understand the evolutionary and adaptive value of different attachment styles
• Learn a set of effective neuroscience-informed interventions to work with a specific attachment style

Who is This Workshop Appropriate For?

• Any therapist interested in learning how to work with adult attachment styles in effective ways that are supported by modern neuroscience research on attachment.

How May This Workshop Impact Your Practice?

• Understanding of the roles that the attachment plays and its adaptive value for survival
• Communicating that understanding to the clients
• Use of effective neuroscience-informed strategies to work with attachment in the therapy room

Additional Resources:

*The summary of the modern neuroscience perspective on attachment

*The toolbox for effective work with avoidant attachment style

Main references:

White LO, Schulz CC, Schoett MJS, Kungl MT, Keil J, Borelli JL, Vrtička P. Conceptual Analysis: A Social Neuroscience Approach to Interpersonal Interaction in the Context of Disruption and Disorganization of Attachment (NAMDA). Front Psychiatry. 2020 Dec 23;11:517372. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2020.517372.

Long M, Verbeke W, Ein-Dor T, Vrtička P. A functional neuro-anatomical model of human attachment (NAMA): Insights from first- and second-person social neuroscience. Cortex. 2020 May;126:281-321. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.01.010.