ScholarWorks@UNO

Attachment level modifies testosterone reactivity in a laboratory setting

It is hypothesized that attachment styles modify testosterone re-activity during a laboratory setting. Preliminary results show that there is an association between attachment styles and stress time points. Through questionnaires given to participants during the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST), we scored and categorized levels of attachment as low, average, and high. We, then analyzed data using Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) to index testosterone re-activity at different time points during the TSST: before, during, and after the experimental stress task. We found that testosterone levels seem to show a significant decrease before the stress task (β=-.157, p=.022) and an even lower levels of testosterone (=-2.802, p<.0001) in individuals who reported having high attachment. Testosterone re-activity was observed among all participants (β=.260, p<.0001), however, higher levels of testosterone re-activity were observed in individuals having high attachment levels (β=2.75, p<.0001). Testosterone levels decline after the stress task, and decline more steeply in high attachment individuals (β=-2.663, p<.0001). We also compared testosterone re-activity on the experimental TSST day to basal day, and found higher testosterone re-activity on the day that the participants were in the lab (β=-.238, p=.014). When attachment levels were considered, results showed significant difference between participants with high attachment and those with average to low attachment. Testosterone re-activity after the stressor test in individuals with average to low attachments decreased (γ=-0.375030, p<0.001); whereas, testosterone re-activity for those with high attachment levels increased (γ=0.295, p<0.001). This analysis indicates that individuals with high attachment levels have less testosterone re-activity when under experimental stress. /