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Parents and children can drive each other mad. At one moment, a parent may be encouraging and affectionate toward the child; in the next, the parent may be sending the child to his or her bedroom. Similarly, a child who seems helpful and cooperative can suddenly turn belligerent. Parents and children may partly resolve the mixture of negative and positive feelings they experience in such situations by remembering their basic love for each other. Nevertheless, the conflicting sentiments will be stored in the memory of both parties, contributing to a long-lasting melange of conflicting beliefs, feelings, and behaviors. What are the psychological consequences of this state of affairs in relationships?

This chapter discusses how attachment theory, a theory that provides insight into the processes through which psychological and emotional bonds are developed in relationships, can be useful for understanding mentoring relationships. We develop a conceptual model emphasizing how attachment-related constructs and their relationships with mentors’ and protégés’ behaviors and emotions influence each phase of a mentoring relationship. Recognizing reciprocity in the mentoring process, the model also explains how the interpersonal dynamics of the mentor–protégé relationship influence the benefits gained by both partners. Propositions for future research on mentoring relationships are provided. We contend that examining mentoring through the lens of attachment theory can increase our understanding of the underlying factors or mechanisms that determine individuals’ involvement in mentoring relationships and differentiate successful from unsuccessful mentoring relationships. The research and practical implications are discussed.

Substantial developmental psychology research on attachment theory documents that children with secure affectional ties (attachments) to caregivers are more likely to excel in psychosocial and behavioral performance than their peers with insecure attachments. We review attachment theory and research in the developmental psychology literature and propose causes of secure short-term attachments to workgroups. Whereas traditional attachment research has documented social–emotional antecedents, we propose social–emotional and task-related antecedents of secure attachment to workgroups. Suggestive data are presented to illustrate our propositions. We discuss theoretical and practical contributions of our attachment theory-based perspective on workgroups, as well as areas for future research.

Thus far, I have introduced the reader to evidence based practice in a broad sense, and evidence based relationships across important variables. In this chapter, I further build on this by extending the need for evidence based responsiveness as applied to client factors. While the practitioner brings themselves and their bag of tools to the therapy encounter, the client brings not just their presenting problem, but their characteristic way of thinking about their problems and how they manage distress and change. Therefore, the supportive practitioner will be best served to understand how these client factors manifest for each individual that they work with. The purpose of this chapter then, is to discuss coping style, reactant level, stage of change, attachment style, and client preferences, within the context of the practitioner being responsive to these factors as they impact on therapy outcomes.

We know a great deal today about the impact of transformational leaders, their actions, typical behaviors and their ways of influencing others (Bass, 1985, 1999a, b; Bass & Avolio, 1990). However, we know relatively little about the psychological substructure, the internal world of these leaders, namely who they are and how they developed this way. These aspects were raised earlier in Bass’s early work (Bass, 1985) but have received little attention so far (Bass, 1998; Judge & Bono, 2000). We argue that the internal world of a transformational leader is characterized by a motivation to lead, leadership self-efficacy, motivation and capacity to relate to others in a pro-social way, optimism and openness to new experiences and viewpoints of others. We further argue that the origins of the ability and motivation to be a transformational leader lie in childhood experiences, and that the development of this ability and motivation can be understood and conceptualized by means of major developmental theories such as attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969, 1973, 1977, 1988). On the basis of these theories, we suggest a researchable conceptual framework for characterization of the internal world and the development of transformational leaders.