Attachment and aggression among adolescents receiving special education services for emotional disturbance

Students classified as emotionally disturbed receiving special education services will drop out of school at a rate of 56% nationwide, and one out of three will be incarcerated within 3 years of leaving school. This study provides school personnel and clinicians with new information regarding underlying attachment difficulties and aggression in the adolescent special education population classified as emotionally disturbed (ED). Previous research has indicated that individuals with attachment difficulties struggle to regulate affective arousal, which may lead to aggression. However, there remains an important gap in the literature regarding whether a relationship exists between aggression and attachment difficulties in adolescents in school based settings. Educators often do not attribute aggression among students classified as ED to attachment difficulties, but instead consider the students to be responding with aggression because of behavioral choices that they can control. This correlational quantitative study examined the relationship between aggression and attachment difficulties. Participants in this study were 39 adolescent special education students classified as ED, their parents, and their special education teachers. A significant relationship was found between aggression and the subtests of insecure attachment, egocentricity, and alienation. Recognizing the underlying attachment difficulties driving the adolescent aggression and developing relevant interventions will drive positive social change. When schools develop relevant interventions, individuals with attachment difficulties may become more able to form and sustain meaningful relationships and decrease their aggression toward others.