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Does the “fearfulness, withdrawal, and passive behavior” that Del Giudice notes (target article, sect. 6.3.2, para. 2) is associated with an ambivalent attachment style, really assist women in retaining their partner and in maximising paternal investment? Preoccupied attachment is characterised by intense desire for closeness, discomfort when not intimately involved with another, and nagging worry about rejection. It is a short step from here to the clinical condition of borderline personality disorder (BPD), with its pervasive relationship instability and frantic efforts to avoid separation or abandonment.
Initial idealisation of the target is coupled with demands for their exclusive attention, but at the first sign of real or imagined rejection, the emotion switches from infatuation to bitter devaluation.
Dependent and borderline personality traits characterise up to 50% of male perpetrators of partner violence, with these men's extreme dependency resulting in a violent response to the wife's perceived rejection or insubordination (Holtzworth-Munroe & Stuart 1994). Following the belated recognition of symmetry in partner violence, women's partner violence has also been related to attachment style. Women receiving mandated treatment for domestic violence show elevated rates of both anxious and avoidant attachment styles and evidence of borderline personality traits (Goldenson et al. 2007). Perhaps because 75% of BPD sufferers are women, there has been a tendency to consider it as a predominantly internalising disorder by emphasising the diagnostic criteria of chronic feelings of emptiness, suicidal behaviour, and self-mutilation.But there are other...