– A real, healthy sense of security is the ability to maintain your philosophy of life in changing circumstances. Feeling that we have influence on many things, limited on some, and none on others. However, we can always decide whether we want to deal with ourselves or ask someone for help. About what our sense of security is and what determines it – says psychologist and psychotherapist Dr. Ewa Pragłowska.
- ARTICLE FROM A SPECIAL EDITION: NEWSWEEK PSYCHOLOGIA 5/2020
- – The need for security is one of the main human needs. It accompanies each of us from our arrival in the world until our death – explains Dr. Pragłowska
- The fact that we feel safe is conditioned by many factors that are still being studied in the field of psychology
- John Bolwlby became interested in the issue of the sense of security, observing the bond between children who were separated from their parents during World War II. He was the first to suggest that the feeling of security may depend on biological, innate factors
- The modeling concept of Alber Bandura is also interesting, as he drew attention to the importance of observing the behavior of significant people in difficult situations in our development.
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Karolina Świdrak: If I had asked a few people about their sense of security, each of them would have probably given a different definition.
Ewa Pragłowska: Probably yes, although most people feel the same sense of security. It is a state in which I am safe, I feel good – in relation to someone, in some situation, place. In psychology, there is a concept of well-being: the lack of negative emotions, the belief that nothing threatens me in this situation, that I control it and have a great sense of self-efficacy.
What does psychology say about feeling safe? What is it, where does it come from, what does it depend on?
– The need for security is one of the main human needs, next to the need to be full, the need to bond and the need to have children. It accompanies each of us from our arrival in the world until our death.
The fact that we feel safe is conditioned by many factors. In the field of psychology, we keep checking what this feeling is related to, how it is shaped, and whether it can change during adulthood.
The sense of security, or rather a secure bond, was first noticed by the British child psychiatrist John Bowlby. During World War II, some children were isolated from their parents, transported from large cities that could be bombed by German planes. They stayed with strangers, in this way the English wanted to protect them from the consequences of the war. As they returned to their parents after a time away, their mothers began to come to John Bowlby, complaining that the children they longed for were not at all enthusiastic to see them. The meeting after the long separation was difficult – the children avoided her when approaching their mother, they did not let her calm down, they were very anxious. Consequently, John Bowlby asked himself: Was it the trauma of distance that caused the children to lose their sense of closeness to their mother? Or maybe for another reason they had a problem with a secure relationship? He wanted to check whether children are born with a tendency to create safe bonds, or whether it is influenced by the mother’s environment and behavior.
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Bowlby’s research was repeated by his student Mary Ainsworth, who conducted a famous experiment with an unknown person or a strange situation. She chose children in the age group between one and four months and one and eight months for it. Why so small? Because they already walked, but the process of verbalization, that is speaking, was not yet formed, so they could not build a sense of security with words.
What was this experiment about?
– Mom disappeared from the sight of the child for some time, and the child was left in a strange room with a stranger. The behavior of the children was monitored. It turned out that 60 percent. while waiting, they played and explored the room, and their mothers reacted enthusiastically when they came back: clinging to it and enjoying it. In the remaining children there were three types of attachment, or rather bond, I prefer the term. Some of them presented an avoidant-fearful bond, i.e. when mother disappeared, they reacted with anxiety and agitation, and when she returned – their agitation did not diminish, they did not come closer to her. The second group are children from the so-called an ambivalent bond – after my mother’s return, they cried, approached her, but her presence did not soothe their emotions, fear and terror. The last group is a disorganized bond – children took matters into their own hands, they soothed, swayed and rocked themselves, that is, they exhibited behaviors that we know as an orphan disease.
This study was replicated and repeated in various groups of children, including culturally different ones. The results have always been similar: happily around 60 percent. we have a secure bond with that first important person in our lives.
Subsequent studies also looked at what happens to these children when they are 15-16 years old. Not surprisingly, children have dealt with a safe relationship in their lives. Most problems arose in the lives of those who had a disorganized bond. They abused various substances, previously undertook sexual initiation (the hypothesis that in search of a sense of security), had worse school achievements measured by grades and the development of a scientific career.
This experiment was to answer the question of whether we come into the world with a sense of security, or do we learn to feel safe during our social development?
– Yes. It turns out that our inborn biological features contribute to our sense of security. An important element is also what in psychology we define as individual differences, i.e. our temperament. Emotional reactivity is also important, as it – high or low – determines the readiness to react with fear to various situations. The higher the reactivity, the greater the willingness to lose sense of security in an emergency.
Albert Bandura’s modeling theory is also interesting. He pointed out how important a role in our development is played by the social context and observing the behavior of other significant people, including in difficult situations. Stated. that our sense of security depends on something called self efficacy, i.e. assessing my own effectiveness, beliefs, to what extent I am able to cope with life challenges.
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No matter what happens to me in my life, I can handle it.
– Exactly. The answer to why some people have strong self-efficacy and others weaker beliefs is extremely complex. There are people who treat failures and failures as a challenge. But there are also those who do not believe in their own agency and strength.
What it depends on?
– First of all, from who they have next to them, especially in the early stages of life. If something fails, they hear: “You’re useless” or rather: “You’re close, try again!”. The latter message is not only a feedback that someone believes in us, but also encourages us to improve and practice certain skills.
So we can learn our own effectiveness?
– The feeling that I can do it is built in the process of collecting experiences on our own, but also through the modeling process, i.e. observing how others cope in a given situation. An important component is what we call a support network in psychology – a few people who I know for sure that in a difficult situation, if I have no idea what to do, they will help me.
Our sense of effectiveness and the sense of security related to it are influenced by our own experiences, building our own agency, but also by significant people who believe in us, who help us. In this sense, you can “work” to feel safe.
My effectiveness is based on other people?
– Yes, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Also in this, if we can say: “I can’t cope” and we seek support.
And can you unlearn your own effectiveness? Believe you are hopeless, lose your sense of security?
– You can. I would like to mention Martin Seligman and his concept of learned helplessness. He conducted the famous experiment on dogs that were in a place where they were electrocuted and could not get away from it, although they tried. It turned out that when they were moved to the cage from which they could escape, they did not. As if they have learned that there is nothing they can do, that after many experiences of failure in escaping an aversive situation, they have learned that they have no influence on it.
People can learn to doubt that they can do it, too, depression being an example. It is a state in which, under the influence of various experiences, especially loss, we can believe that everything that happens to us is our fault, it will always be like this and it will not change. An extreme example of insecurity measured by one’s own effectiveness is a suicide attempt. We know from research that people who one hundred percent believe that they will never experience anything other than disaster, loss and loneliness in their life are at greater risk of suicide than those who are 70 percent convinced of it.
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How to distinguish a person who feels safe from one who fakes it, uses different types of masks?
– People with a perfectionist nature look for security in the fact that they plan everything that will happen very carefully. They want to predict everything and even plan what will happen in their entire life. Paradoxically, these are people filled with fear.
But they get their sense of security from trying to control everything.
Increased control may create the illusion of security, but it is not a substitute for it. We are unable to plan or predict very many events. This construct of self-efficacy that Bandura talked about implies a certain amount of flexibility, accepting that unforeseen things will happen, beyond my control, which does not change the belief that I can handle it, for example by asking other people for help. I know people who build a sense of security on the attitude of Zosia-Samoś and the belief that if I can do everything myself, I will feel safe because I will not have to rely on anyone. After all, relying on people is deceptive – they can refuse and what will I do?
Another example is obsessive-compulsive, anankastic people, i.e. lovers of perfect order, who always pay their bills on time, have clothes prepared for winter in the summer, and money set aside even for their own funeral, because nothing can surprise them. This strategy is designed to help you feel safe, but it is not. They are usually highly reactive people who react more easily with fear in an emergency.
- How about becoming internally optimistic and stop worrying?
So what is the real sense of security?
– A real, healthy sense of security is a kind of acceptance, consent to uncertainty. It is the ability to maintain your philosophy of life in changing circumstances. The feeling that many things I have influence, some I have limited, and others – none. But what I can always do, no matter what the situation is, is to decide if I want to cope on my own or ask someone for help. We have friends to ask, “What would you do in my situation?”, To get a different perspective.
There are people who believe that they can only feel safe if they have someone next to them for 24 hours, who solves problems, takes care of things and ensures that everything will be fine. These are dependents. And if the one we rely on moves away, or the relationship ends for some reason, those people usually experience a deep depression, their world collapses.
How to work on a sense of security? Can therapy help us with this?
– Definitely yes! One of the founders of the cognitive-behavioral approach, Albert Ellis, said that what is the result of psychotherapy is a new philosophy of life. A philosophy close to the Stoics who accept the world as it is, feel responsible only for what they can feel responsible for. Everyone’s sense of security at birth is different, because it is probably conditioned by temperamental traits. And then, when we are born with such and not another temperament, the exchange between me and the world begins to take place, i.e. what prof. Andrzej Eliasz called the transactional model of temperament. Research shows that the loss of an important person – a parent, siblings up to the age of 12-13. Age of age is a certain predictor of depression later in life, but not 100 percent. Why? It depends on what significance the child gave to this loss, how people from the closest environment of the child reacted to this event, what they said to the child in this extremely traumatic moment of life, how they coped with the loss themselves. We also know that people predisposed to react with depression have a slightly greater emotional reactivity, which suggests that the same stressful situation is an emotionally different experience for them than for less reactive children.
In cognitive behavioral therapy, we look at our beliefs, including our own effectiveness. Why do I think that I have no influence on anything, that I am alone, who would like to establish a relationship with me? Therapy allows you to put your own beliefs in perspective and see if they are true. An important element of the therapy is the analysis of whether the strategies used so far bring us closer to achieving life goals or not, e.g. a sense of security. Are negative emotions such as anxiety and sadness a result of how we think about ourselves, others, and the world? So if you believe that insecurity is having a negative effect on your life, therapy may be worth considering.
***
Dr. Ewa Pragłowska,
Clinical psychologist, psychotherapist and supervisor of cognitive-behavioral therapy. Director of Collaboration and Teaching at the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Clinic of the SWPS University, co-head of the School of Psychotherapy for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy at the SWPS University, associate of the Center for Clinical Research and Psychotherapy Improvement at SWPS University.
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