“I Think It Just Helped Me See:” Incorporating Attachment into Reflecting Teams

Abstract

ABSTRACT Historically, hope has been studied from a cognitive, not experiential, lens and rarely from an attachment perspective. The aims of this research were to explore how couples experience hope when using a reflecting team (RT) as part of their counseling process as well as if their experience of hope differed based depending on their attachment style. To examine these questions, couples (n = 13) completed attachment measures as well as participated in interviews assessing their experience of hope in relation to the reflecting team. The research was methodologically directed by interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA), which draws on the participants’ meaning-making of the reflecting team process. Participants’ attachment strategies impacted which interventions used by the reflecting teams were most relevant and powerful in inducing hope.