Attachment in Mentoring Relationships

Attachment theory has high potential for advancing a relational understanding of mentoring. However, there is a lack of empirical evidence that proteges develop attachments to mentors. The present manuscript provides this foundation by developing and validating a measure of attachment to mentors across five studies. In Study 1, we find qualitative evidence that proteges experience the four features of attachment in their relationships with mentors. In Study 2, we develop a pool of items to measure attachment to mentors and conduct content validation. In Studies 3a and 3b, we develop a multidimensional measure of attachment and conduct exploratory and confirmatory analyses. In Study 4, we replicate the factor structure and provide evidence of reliability and measurement invariance over time. Consistent with attachment theory, we find that attachment to mentors is related to, and empirically distinct from, mentor support, protege work-related exploration, protege attachment anxiety and avoidance, and relationship satisfaction in the hypothesized directions. Our findings support the application of attachment theory to mentoring relationships and provide an empirical foundation for future examination of the development, maintenance, and termination of attachment relationships in the work domain. Moreover, our work offers a new measurement tool and insights for assessing and developing mentoring relationships in practice.