Parental Embodied Mentalizing and its Relation to Mind-Mindedness, Sensitivity, and Attachment Security

Relations between two forms of parental mentalizing—maternal mind-mindedness (appropriate and nonattuned mind-related comments) and parental embodied mentalizing (PEM)—and their role in predicting infant attachment security were investigated. Maternal PEM and mind-mindedness were assessed at 8 months (N = 206), and infant attachment security was assessed at 15 months. PEM was positively correlated with appropriate mind-related comments and was unrelated to nonattuned mind-related comments. Multinomial regression analyses showed that higher PEM distinguished between secure versus insecure–avoidant infants and between insecure–resistant versus insecure–avoidant infants over and above the contributions of appropriate and nonattuned mind-related comments. These results suggest that both verbal and nonverbal indices of parental mentalizing make independent contributions in predicting the security of the infant–mother attachment relationship.