Description

The Relationship Scales Questionnaire (RSQ-30) is a self-report instrument designed to assess the way individuals perceive and experience close interpersonal relationships.

The questionnaire focuses primarily on two core dimensions of adult attachment, attachment anxiety and avoidance, while also examining four attachment styles: secure, fearful, preoccupied, and dismissing.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the RSQ-30 is to assess the dimensions of attachment anxiety and avoidance, as well as to explore different attachment patterns in close relationships.

The instrument contributes to a better understanding of how individuals relate to significant others, manage intimacy and dependence, and respond to emotional closeness within interpersonal relationships.

Structure

The RSQ-30 consists of 30 items. These items were selected from previously established measures of adult attachment, including the attachment measures developed by Hazan and Shaver (1987), the Relationship Questionnaire (RQ) by Bartholomew and Griffin, and the Adult Attachment Scale developed by Collins and Read.

Participants are asked to indicate the extent to which each statement reflects their personal way of thinking, behaving, and feeling in close interpersonal relationships.

Scoring

Responses are provided using a 5-point scale, with participants indicating the degree to which each statement reflects their own relational experiences.

Scores for the dimensions of anxiety and avoidance, as well as for the four attachment styles, are calculated by taking the mean of the items corresponding to each scale.

The dimensional assessment of anxiety and avoidance may provide a more continuous representation of attachment tendencies than a purely categorical classification.

Sample

In the reported adaptation, the questionnaire was administered to 460 adults aged 18 to 25 years, with a mean age of 21 years.

The sample included 209 men (45.4%) and 251 women (54.6%) and consisted mainly of students attending public vocational training institutes in Thessaloniki and Chalkidiki and departments of the Technological Educational Institute of Thessaloniki.

Validity

A two-factor confirmatory factor analysis provided support for the dimensions of anxiety and avoidance.

For the avoidance dimension, factor loadings were satisfactory for most of the relevant items, while the anxiety dimension showed item-loading patterns similar to those proposed in the corresponding theoretical model.

However, the four originally proposed attachment styles were not fully confirmed by the factor structure. The analysis suggested four distinct attachment patterns that differed from the original classification proposed by the developers.

Reliability

Internal consistency was satisfactory for the two primary dimensions, with reliability coefficients of approximately 0.83 for anxiety and 0.60 for avoidance.

For the four attachment styles, internal consistency coefficients ranged from 0.53 to 0.74, indicating varying levels of reliability across the individual attachment categories.

Applications

The RSQ-30 can be used in psychological research, counseling, clinical assessment, and studies of interpersonal relationships.

It may be particularly useful for examining relationships between attachment and variables such as relationship quality, emotional regulation, trust, intimacy, mental health, and interpersonal difficulties.

References

Griffin, D., & Bartholomew, K. (1994). Models of the self and other: Fundamental dimensions underlying measures of adult attachment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67(3), 430–445.

Kurdek, L. A. (2002). On being insecure about the assessment of attachment styles. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 19(6), 811–834.

Hazan, C., & Shaver, P. (1987). Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52(3), 511–524.

Collins, N. L., & Read, S. J. (1990). Adult attachment, working models, and relationship quality in dating couples. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58(4), 644–663.