They seemed perfect at first. Available. Interested. Then you got close and they disappeared. Not physically. Just emotionally. Present but absent. There when things are light, gone when things matter.
You’re left wondering if you did something wrong. If you’re too much. If love is supposed to feel this confusing. If you find yourself constantly seeking reassurance and struggling with the uncertainty, you might have an anxious preoccupied attachment style.
You’re probably not dealing with someone who doesn’t care. You’re dealing with dismissive avoidant attachment.
What Is Dismissive Avoidant Attachment?
Dismissive avoidant attachment is one of the four main attachment styles identified in psychological research. It’s characterised by a deep discomfort with emotional closeness and an excessive need for independence.
People with this attachment style have usually learned very early that relying on others is dangerous. That seeking comfort leads to disappointment. That the safest way to survive is to need no one.
Research published in 2024 in Nature Reviews Neuroscience shows this isn’t just a personality quirk. It’s a neurobiological pattern. Brain imaging reveals that dismissive avoidant individuals show reduced activation in reward circuits when viewing scenes of comfort or distress. Their brains literally dim the signal that says “closeness is rewarding.”
This is strategic deactivation, not emotional absence. Their nervous system has been trained to turn down the volume on attachment needs as a form of self-protection.
What’s Actually Happening in Their Brain
A 2024 fMRI study looked at how people with different attachment styles process distress and comfort. The dismissive avoidant participants showed something striking: lower brain activation across the board, particularly in the approach and reward systems.
When shown images of comfort, that is, scenes designed to evoke feelings of safety and connection, secure individuals lit up in areas associated with reward and approach motivation. Dismissive avoidants didn’t.
Their prefrontal cortex, the analytical part of the brain, was working overtime. They were thinking, analysing, keeping themselves cognitively busy. Meanwhile, the limbic regions involved in emotion and reward, particularly areas like the amygdala and ventral striatum, were quiet.
What this means for you
When your partner pulls away during intimate moments, it’s not because they don’t care. Their brain is doing what it’s been conditioned to do—protect them from what feels like engulfment or vulnerability. The very moment you’re reaching for closeness, their nervous system is treating it as a threat.
The same research shows they use more cognitive and self-regulation strategies to manage emotion. They’re constantly working to keep feelings at a manageable distance. Not because feelings aren’t there, but because letting them surface feels unbearable.
Signs You’re With a Dismissive Avoidant
They vanish after intimacy. Not just sexual intimacy. Emotional intimacy. After a deep conversation, they become distant. After you open up, they pull back. Brain imaging research shows that for dismissive avoidants, closeness doesn’t activate reward centres the way it does for securely attached people. What feels good to you feels overwhelming to them. This differs from fearful avoidant attachment, where people want closeness but are terrified of it – dismissive avoidants have learned to simply not want it.
They’re excessively self-reliant. They don’t ask for help. They don’t share struggles. They pride themselves on not needing anyone. Studies on dismissive avoidant attachment show altered grey matter in brain regions involved in social memory and relational processing. They’ve literally built neural pathways that reinforce independence over connection.
Commitment triggers distance. As soon as the relationship gets serious, they find reasons to create space. More work. More hobbies. Less availability. It’s not that they don’t want you. It’s that wanting feels dangerous.
They intellectualise emotions. When you try to discuss feelings, they analyse. Rationalise. Explain. Anything to avoid actually feeling. The 2024 research shows increased prefrontal activity during emotional scenes—they’re thinking their way out of feeling.
Your needs feel like criticism. When you express a need for reassurance or connection, they hear it as an attack on their independence. They become defensive or shut down entirely.
Where Dismissive Avoidant Attachment Comes From
Attachment patterns form early. Very early. A 2018 study using structural brain imaging found that avoidant attachment is linked to differences in grey matter volume in regions associated with memory and social processing.
The pattern typically develops in childhood when caregivers are consistently emotionally unavailable or dismissive of the child’s needs. The child learns that seeking comfort doesn’t work. That expressing vulnerability leads to rejection or indifference. That the only safe strategy is to stop asking.
This isn’t a conscious decision. It’s adaptation. The developing brain reorganises itself around the reality that others cannot be relied upon for emotional support.
Epigenetic research shows that early caregiving experiences can alter gene expression related to oxytocin and stress regulation. The child’s biology adjusts to match their relational environment. By adulthood, these patterns are deeply embedded, not just psychologically, but neurobiologically.
This didn’t happen to spite you. It happened before you. Their withdrawal isn’t personal. It’s a protection mechanism formed decades before you met them.
Can Dismissive Avoidant Attachment Change?
Yes. The same neuroscience that shows how the pattern forms also shows it’s not fixed.
A 2014 study on attachment security priming found something remarkable: when dismissive avoidant individuals were exposed to cues of secure attachment (reminders of supportive relationships), the typical heightened amygdala response to social threat disappeared. The defensive pattern was reversible at the neural level.
The 2024 Nature Reviews paper frames attachment patterns as plastic, modifiable adaptations rather than fixed traits. Major relational experiences – including therapy and supportive partnerships – are associated with meaningful increases in attachment security, even in adulthood.
Therapies that show benefit include attachment-based approaches, emotion-focused therapy, and compassion-focused work. These methods repeatedly activate secure relational experiences, gradually weakening deactivating scripts and updating expectations about what closeness means. At The Private Therapy Clinic, we work with individuals and couples navigating relationship difficulties rooted in attachment patterns.
But here’s the reality: change requires them wanting it. You cannot fix this for them. You cannot love them into security, this does not work. Dismissive avoidants often don’t see their patterns as a problem because the entire point of the adaptation is to minimise distress by minimising need. From their perspective, it works.
If they’re not motivated to work on this, if they don’t recognise the cost of their disconnection, then no amount of patience or understanding from you will change the dynamic.
Knowing When to Stay and When to Protect Yourself
Stay if: They acknowledge the pattern. They’re willing to engage in therapy. They can tolerate small steps toward vulnerability, even if it’s uncomfortable. They make genuine effort, even when it’s slow.
Protect yourself if: They deny there’s a problem. They blame you for wanting too much. They refuse to consider therapy or dismiss your concerns as neediness. You’re constantly adjusting yourself to avoid triggering their withdrawal.
Understanding the neuroscience doesn’t mean tolerating harm. You can have compassion for their struggle while also recognising that you deserve a relationship where your needs for connection aren’t treated as burdens.
If You Recognise Yourself in This
Some dismissive avoidants do seek help. Usually after a pattern of relationships that end the same way. After realising that independence has become isolation.
The cost of deactivation is real. Missed connection. Repeated relationship failures. A life that feels manageable but empty.
The research on neural plasticity is encouraging. Your brain can learn new patterns. Therapy that focuses on gradual exposure to emotional intimacy, combined with work on recognising and tolerating vulnerability, can shift these deeply embedded responses.
It won’t be comfortable. The entire point of dismissive avoidance is to avoid discomfort. But the alternative, that is continuing to push away everyone who gets close, has its own kind of pain.
Dismissive avoidant attachment isn’t a life sentence. The neuroscience shows that these patterns, while deeply rooted, are modifiable. Whether you’re trying to understand a dismissive avoidant partner or recognising these patterns in yourself, change is possible – but it requires willingness, not just understanding.
If you want to learn more about attachment styles and how they show up in relationships, Attached by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller is an accessible, research-based guide that explains the science without the jargon.
Help at The Private Therapy Clinic
If you think you might benefit from speaking to someone about the issues in this article, we offer a FREE 15-MINUTE CONSULTATION with one of our specialists to help you find the best way to move forward.
At The Private Therapy Clinic, we specialise in attachment-focused therapy and couples therapy for relationship difficulties. We also offer comprehensive autism and ADHD assessments.
