INVESTIGATING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PERSONALITY TRAITS, ATTACHMENT STYLES & RELATIONSHIP SATISFACTION IN ROMANTIC RELATIONSHIPS OF COUPLES

Abstract

Personality traits and attachment styles are important predictors of relationship satisfaction. The study was a cross-sectional study and included 77 heterogeneous couples ranging in age from 25-45 years. All participants completed three questionnaires including Adult Attachment Scale, Relationship Assessment Scale and NEO-FFI. The main analyses were based on Spearman’s Rank Correlation & Mann-Whitney U test. Some general findings emerged in the study. Neuroticism was positively related with attachment anxiety and avoidance. Conscientiousness, extraversion and agreeableness were negatively correlated with attachment anxiety and avoidance but positively correlated with Relationship satisfaction. Attachment anxiety and avoidance had negative correlation with Relationship satisfaction. Women scored higher than males on measures of neuroticism in personality. Males extraversion scores were considerably greater than women's. The present results contributed to the literature by showing that each perspective is essential for the understanding of the role of personality and attachment style for relationship satisfaction.