Investigating attachment styles and identity styles in immigrant and non-immigrant groups in Tehran

Among the important variables related to immigration are the attachment styles and identity of people, because immigration is accompanied by rapid changes in social function and communication, and this can lead to the formation of attachment anxiety and identity changes in people. However, few researches have been done in the field of comparison of attachment styles and identity in immigrant and non-immigrant people.

The aim was to compare identity styles and attachment styles in Iranian international immigrants and non-immigrants.

The current research was of causal-comparative type based on survey method. The statistical population of the research included all immigrants to Western European countries from 2012 to 2018 and Iranian non-immigrants in 2021 in Tehran. With the available sampling method, 200 people (100 immigrants and 100 non-immigrants). They responded to Berzonsky’s Identity Style Inventory (1992) and Collins and Read Adult Attachment Scale (1990) questionnaires. Multivariate variance analysis and SPSS23 software were used for data analysis.

The results showed that there was no significant difference between the immigrant and non-immigrant groups in the variables of informative, normative, confused-avoidant style. (P<0.05); but, there was a significant difference between the two groups of emigrants and non-emigrants regarding dependency attachment (P< 0.05), but this only explains 17% of the difference between the two groups; also, there was no significant difference between the two groups regarding insecure attachment style and secure attachment style (P< 0.05).

In line with the obtained results, it can be concluded that there is no significant difference in identity styles between immigrants and non-immigrants, and immigrants scored higher only in the dependence component of the attachment variable. Therefore, it is necessary to pay more attention to attachment damage in immigrant people.