As Valentine’s Day approaches, restaurant bookings fill up and couples exchange cards, flowers and carefully chosen gifts. For some, it’s a day of closeness and connection. For others, it can bring anxiety, disappointment or emotional distance.
These different reactions may feel deeply personal. But in terms of psychology, they may reflect something much deeper – how we learned to attach to other people in childhood.
Attachment theory offers a powerful way of understanding why romantic relationships unfold the way they do, and why partners can sometimes feel emotionally mismatched. Developed over decades of research, it suggests that our earliest experiences of care shape how safe, connected or vulnerable we feel in adult love.
