Bu çalışma farklı engel grupları olan kadınların bağlanma stillerini belirlemek amacıyla yapıldı. Engelli kadınların bağlanma stillerini değerlendirmeye yönelik olarak yapılan bu araştırma kapsamında, Ankara ilinde yaşayan engelli kadınlar araştırmanın evrenini oluşturmaktadır. Örneklemi Ankara'da bulunan bir üniversiteye rehabilitasyon amacıyla başvuran engelli kadınlar oluşturmaktadır. Örneklem, bu bölümde tedavi olan engelli kadınlar arasından tesadüfi olarak seçilmiştir. Araştırmada 18-60 yaş arası 98 engelli kadınla tedaviye geldiklerinde, tedaviden önce anket çalışması yapılmıştır. Araştırmaya katılan engelli kadınların yaş, medeni durum, çalışma durumunu, engel türü gibi demografik özelliklerini belirlemek için sosyodemografik bilgi formu, bağlanma stillerini belirlemek için de İlişki Ölçekleri Anketi kullanılmıştır. Sonuç olarak engelli kadınlar arasında en yaygın bağlanma stilinin güvenli bağlanma stili (% 43.9) olduğu görülmüştür. Bunu sırasıyla korkulu (% 28.6), kayıtsız (%14.3), saplantılı (13.3) bağlanma stillerinin takip ettiği belirlenmiştir. Hem çalışan hem de çalışmayan engelli kadınlarda güvenli bağlanma stilinin en yaygın görülen bağlanma stili olduğu belirlenmiştir. Doğuştan engelli olanlarda korkulu (% 37.7), sonradan engelli olanlarda ise güvenli bağlanma(% 80.4) stilinin yaygın olduğu görülmüştür. Engel türüne göre bakıldığında ortopedik engellilerde, dil ve konuşma bozukluğu olanlarda, görme engellilerde güvenli bağlanma stilinin en yaygın olduğu tespit edilmiştir. İşitme engellilerde ve süreğen hastalığı olanlarda ise hem güvenli hem de korkulu bağlanmanın eşit oranda olduğu saptanmıştır. Bu çalışma sonucunda elde edilen verilerin farklı engel grupları olan kadınların bu engellerinden ne ölçüde etkilendiklerinin belirlenmesinde ve sorunlarının saptanmasında çözüm yolları için farkındalık oluşturacağı umulmaktadır

A person's attachment style is determined early in life and is thought to be persistent, shaping the contact pattern of the person with others (Bowlby 1973). Bartholomew recommended a four-way pattern for the attachment process in adulthood according to whether the individual has positive or negative views about himself/herself and others. Accordingly, individuals with a secure attachment style have positive cognitive patterns regarding both themselves and others. These individuals have a secure and happy attitude towards their relationships and accept the faults of their spouses easily. Individuals with a preoccupied attachment styles have a negative pattern towards themselves and positive towards others. They are not uncomfortable when close to others but experience feelings of abandonment. Indıviduals with a dismissing attachment style have a positive pattern towards themselves and negative towards others. They are afraid of suffering and of developing attachments and close relationships make them uncomfortable. Finally, individuals with a fearful attachment style have a negative pattern towards themselves and others. They are afraid of closeness and therefore avoid it. They want to establish social relationships but fear being abandoned. They also avoid romantic relationships (İlhan, 2012; Morsünbül, 2011). Our society emphasizes the positive characteristics of the body structure. Body appearance has a large effect on self-respect, and evaluation of the body and the way it is perceived by the person are gradually becoming more important. Disabled people generally have a different body appearance and are among those most commonly affected by this attitude of the society. It can be said that disabled people are affected by this negative attitude and the judgments directed at themselves and internalize these attitudes so that their self-esteem and attachment styles are ultimately affected. Getting married, being employed, adapting to family life, learning to live together, and having and raising children are among the tasks expected from the individual by the society in early adulthood (Onur, 2003). The fulfillment of these tasks by the individual ensures societal status. Society's expectations from disabled individuals in this period are limited, as in other periods. The disabled individual is isolated from the society and the expectations of the family, social environment and gradually the society and even the person's own expectations are at an extremely low level. Children with disabilities that develop at an early age face more protective behavior than children without disabilities. Some parents are overly protective and believe that their child with disability cannot perform the developmental tasks of that period. Disabled people encounter such beliefs throughout life (Demiröz, 2000: 48; İçağasıoğlu Çoban, 2003: 42). Low self-perception and self-esteem affect their attachment styles negatively from childhood. Disabled people therefore cannot easily rely on others in close relationships The first childhood experiences of individuals are extremely important in shaping their behavior and interpersonal relationships. This also applies to disabled women. The attachment styles shaped with the first childhood experiences can affect the daily life, friendly relationships, marriage and romantic relationships of these women. Disabled women cannot trust and effectively communicate with those around them in later years. We hope that this study can make a significant contribution to determining the attachment styles that being disabled may cause. The sample of this study consisted of disabled females who presented to a university in Ankara for rehabilitation and the subjects were randomly selected among the disabled females who were treated at our department. The study questionnaire was administered before treatment to 98 disabled women aged 18 to 60 years when they came for treatment in this study. The subjects were selected among disabled women who had no mental disability. A sociodemographic information form including questions aiming to determine the demographic characteristics such as age, marital status, educational status, working status and the type of disability and the Relationship Scales Questionnaire were administered to the disabled women in the sample to collect the data required for the study. There were 18 subjects aged 18-24 years (18.4%), 15 aged 25-30 years (15.3%), 13 aged 31-35 years (13.3%), 8 aged 36-40 years (8.2%), 16 aged 41-45 years (16.3%), 7 aged 46-50 years (7.1%) and 21 over 51 years (21.4%). Forty of the females were married (40.8%), 6 were divorced (6.1%), 46 had never married (46.9%), and 6 were widows (6.1%) We had 7 subjects who were illiterate, 7 could only read and write, 21 were primary school graduates, 14 secondary school/elementary school graduates, 24 high school graduates, 2 undergraduates and 23 university students or graduates. While the ratios of subjects who were primary school, secondary school or university graduates were similar, there was also a high percentage of illiterate subjects or those who could only read and write. Employment status evaluation revealed that 22 of our 98 subjects were working while 76 were not working. Factors such as employment problems in Turkey, limitation of job opportunities for people with disabilities and the inability of women to participate in the business environment are thought to be effective in this high rate of women who were not working. According to Genç and Çat (2013), the disabled population in our country cannot develop professional skills as a result of the education problems they experience and this may be the reason for not working. The monthly income level was below the minimum wage in 32 subjects, at the minimum wage level in 20, 1000 to 1500 TL in 33, 1501 to 2000 TL in 9, 2001 to 2500 TL in 3 subjects and 3001 to 3500 TL in 1 subject. The reason for the high percentage of subjects with a monthly income of 1000 to 1500 TL may be the manual workers and the civil servant subjects who are employed through the Disabled Civil Servant Selection Examination. The generally low income can be related to 77.6% of the subjects not working. The disability was orthopedic in 37, hearing-related in 19, speech and language-related in 3 and visual in 19 subjects while a chronic disease was present in 20. The highest rate belonged to orthopedic disabilities, probably because women with orthopedic disabilities are more involved in the society and can leave home with treatment. Chronic disease was second, followed by visual and hearing-related disabilities. The high rate of subjects who become disabled later in life among those with orthopedic, visual and hearing disabilities in our country as well as individuals coming to the city for treatment could explain the fact that 68.4% of our subjects had become disabled later in life. Evaluation of the frequency and percentage distribution of the four attachment styles of disabled women with the Relationship Scales Questionnaire showed the most common attachment style in this group to be the secure attachment style, followed by the fearful, dismissing and preoccupied attachment styles. Secure attachment was the most common attachment style in the age groups of 18-24, 25- 30, 31-35, 36-40, 41-45 years and over the age of 51. The secure, dismissing and preoccupied attachment styles were seen at equal rates in the 46-50 years age group. The secure binding style was more common in married subjects or those who had never married while the fearful attachment style was more common in widows. The secure, preoccupied and fearful attachment styles were seen at equal rates in the divorced disabled subjects. The secure attachment style was more common in illiterate subjects and high school, undergraduate and university graduates. The fearful attachment style was more common in primary/secondary school graduates. Secure, dismissing and preoccupied attachment styles were seen at equal rates in subjects who could only read and write. Fearful attachment was common in primary school graduates. The secure attachment style was found to be most common attachment style among both working and not working disabled women. Evaluation of the attachment style according to income status revealed the fearful attachment style to be most common in those with a monthly income of 1000-1500 TL while the secure attachment style was the most common in the other groups. Attachment style evaluation according to disability type revealed the secure attachment style to be the most common in individuals with an orthopedic, language and speech, or visual disability. Secure and fearful attachment styles were found equally commonly in individuals with a hearing disability and chronic disease.The fearful attachment style was common in the subjects with a congenital disability and the secure attachment style in subjects who had become disabled later in life. The most common attachment style among disabled women was the secure attachment style in this study that we conducted to investigate the attachment styles of women in different disability groups. The presence of an attachment styles other than secure is seen as undesirable (Morsünbül et al, 2010). We found that 43% of our subjects had a secure attachment style while 57% had other attachment styles. We can therefore say that the majority of women with various disabilities had unfavorable attachment styles. As reported by Karataş and Gökçearslan Çifci (2010), subjects with disabilities generally do not have the opportunity to build close relationships. We can say that building close relationships and the secure attachment style are closely associated. The rate of secure attachment was quite high in the various disability groups in our study. Individuals with a secure attachment style have positive cognitive patterns regarding both themselves and others. Close relationships do not make them uncomfortable as they have high self-esteem. They do not suffer from fear of abandonment and do not experience serious interpersonal problems (Kobak and Sceery, 1988; Bartholomew and Horowitz, 1991). Rice and Mirzadeh (2000) also reported that individuals with a secure attachment style show secure attachment behavior in both social and close relationships. Yatkın (2004) et al. reported that people with orthopedic and visual disabilities can be quickly noticed in daily life and therefore are prone to receiving instant feedback. We found that our subjects with easily noticed problems such as orthopedic and visual disabilities had a secure attachment style. The fact that we also found high self-esteem levels and good interpersonal relationships in the disabled women indicates that they do not see the society's attitude towards them as unfavorable. Yumuşak (2004) reported that there was a positive relationship between the self-respect levels of disabled adolescents with orthopedic or visual disabilities and their perceptions of social attitudes directed at themselves. Marriage involves establishing a romantic relationship and trust. Individuals with secure attachment styles can easily approach their spouses and feel happy to be attached to them. They can build longterm relationships (Bartholomew, 1994). We found the secure attachment style to be the most common style among the married individuals in our study. There is a big difference between the literacy rates of Turkish males and females and the number of disabled persons with no education is high. The percentage of subjects receiving an education is lower in disabled girls than in disabled boys or non-disabled girls (www.ozida.gov.tr). Many families have low expectations for the education of their disabled daughter (Duyan and Karataş, 2005). The percentages of the subjects at the level of primary school, high school and university were close but the high rates of illiterate subjects and those who could only read and write reflect the approach to education of families with a disabled child. The secure attachment style was the most common attachment style in disabled women, both working and not working. Realizing one's ambitions by being employed is a universal need but we feel further studies are required to evaluate why not working does not affect the secure attachment style. The report of the 'healthcare problem of women who are disabled later in life' workshop with the Disabled Women and Health Symposium (2009) concluded that ‘there is less trouble when disability develops slowly while sudden life changes lead to difficulties in reorganizing life and adapting to the new situation; those around the subject and the society do not know how to react to the disabled individual and it is possible for good-intentioned acts to cause psychological damage instead of good; the person disabled later in life does not try to have herself accepted by the society and stays away and has little chance of leaving the house'. However, we found that a secure attachment style was common in subjects who became disabled later in life, in contrast to these remarks. It is very important to know the characteristics of disabled individuals for the services to be provided to be effective. For example, if the attachment styles of the disabled women who attend the rehabilitation program can be identified, correct strategies can be determined to build effective communication and a higher degree of success will be ensured in achieving rehabilitation targets. Similarly, knowing the attachment styles of disabled women who are attending marriage counseling will make the process more useful. We hope that the data obtained from this study will create awareness for finding ways to identify how women in different disability