Conflict-Coparenting Spillover: The Role of Actors' and Partners' Attachment Insecurity and Gender

The current research applied a dyadic perspective to examine conflict-coparenting spillover by examining (a) whether actors' or partners' hostility during couples' conflict discussions predicted greater hostility in a subsequent play activity with their child and (b) whether these actor and partner effects were moderated by two factors that prior theory and research suggest may shape conflict-coparenting spillover: attachment insecurity and parent gender. Cohabiting or married couples were video recorded discussing their most serious conflict while their 4-5-year-old child was in a separate room (N = 94 families). Immediately following their conflict discussions, couples were reunited with their child to participate in a semistructured family activity. Independent teams of observational coders rated how much each partner displayed (a) hostility during the conflict discussion (conflict hostility) and (b) hostility during the family activity (coparenting hostility). The results provide novel evidence that conflict-coparenting spillover is a dyadic process shaped by actors' and partners' attachment insecurity and gender. Men exhibited greater conflict-coparenting spillover even if they were low in attachment anxiety, but men's conflict-coparenting spillover was lower when their partners were lower in attachment anxiety and avoidance. Women's lower attachment anxiety also was associated with women's own lower conflict-coparenting spillover. This pattern suggests that men are more vulnerable to conflict-coparenting spillover, whereas women lower in attachment anxiety and avoidance appear able to contain both their own and their partners' conflict hostility from spilling over to family interactions.