Many couples hear the phrase attachment in therapy and wonder what it means in everyday life. In emotionally focused couple therapy, it refers to how partners reach for each other, pull away, protest or shut down when they feel disconnected. A new trial with Spanish-speaking couples found mixed changes in these behaviours. Some were more favourable in the therapy group, others were not clearly different from the waitlist, and the findings should not be read as proof of lasting security.
The trial was published online on 23 September 2026 in the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy. It took place across five countries: Mexico, Argentina, Spain, Costa Rica and Guatemala. Seventy couples were randomly assigned either to emotionally focused couple therapy or to a waitlist, and 68 were analysed after two couples withdrew before starting. All were different-sex couples, most were married and had lived together for more than five years, and the average ages were 44 for women and 46 for men.
Therapy couples completed questionnaires after each session and received an average of 18.8 sessions. Couples on the waitlist received a weekly questionnaire by email and were later offered a Hold Me Tight workshop. The main measures were attachment behaviours, rated by each person about themselves and by their partner, and a short measure of how well the couple was adjusting.
The results were mixed. Only the women's attachment behaviours as rated by their partners improved significantly more in the therapy group than in the waitlist group. Men's own ratings of their behaviours rose in both groups, with larger gains in the therapy group, but women's and men's self-ratings did not show clear, consistent differences between groups across all of the analyses. In the models that looked at change across sessions, the effect was significant for partner-rated behaviours but not for self-rated behaviours.
When the researchers counted the share of people with a reliable improvement, the groups did not differ on self-ratings. For partner-rated behaviours among women, 24.2% of the therapy group improved reliably compared with 9.1% of the waitlist group, but this difference was only marginal and did not meet the usual cut-off for statistical significance. For men the figures were 17.6% and 9.7%, with no significant difference.
Both self-rated and partner-rated attachment behaviours were linked to relationship adjustment scores, and the effect of therapy on relationship adjustment over sessions was statistically significant but very small. Partner-rated behaviours also improved over time in the waitlist group, which the authors partly attribute to non-specific factors, such as taking part in a study and thinking about the relationship.
The authors point to limited statistical power, so small differences between groups may have gone undetected. Findings were inconsistent across gender and across who was doing the rating, so there is no single clear message. The attachment questionnaire has not been formally validated in Spanish-speaking populations, and the short relationship adjustment scale had low internal consistency at the start, which weakens how far its scores can be trusted.
Follow-up data were collected but not analysed in this paper, so the study cannot say whether changes lasted. Most couples were educated and of medium to high socioeconomic status, and all were different-sex couples, so the results may not apply to other couples. Improvement on selected measures is not evidence of permanent relationship security or of a particular outcome for any couple.
This article does not apply to relationships involving violence, control or fear. If you are not safe, call 000 in an emergency or Lifeline on 13 11 14. Couple therapy is not designed for those situations.
In everyday terms, the study asked whether partners reached for each other more clearly, responded more reliably and withdrew or protested less. The answer depended on who was asking. Partners' views of each other and people's views of themselves did not always line up, which is common in couples and is one reason researchers collect both.
Source: Attachment Behavior Change Following Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy: A Randomized Controlled Trial With Spanish-Speaking Couples DOI: 10.1111/jmft.70173
AI-generated editorial illustration. The scene is fictional and does not depict a study participant or demonstrate treatment effectiveness. This article summarises published research in our own words and is general information, not personal health advice.
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