Love without a doubt is a really complicated matter to understandsince falling in love is not something mechanical or that has a great perfect theory behind it. There are several voices that try to shed light on this, with messages such as that one falls in love with whoever one wants. by the psychoanalyst Gabriel Rolón. But the truth is that Science has put the data on the table to understand loveand childhood trauma is undoubtedly very present.
The theory of attachment. Formulated by John Bowlby and that suggests that the dynamic with our primary caregivers installs an emotional “operating system.” In this way, if there was security during childhood, a secure attachment develops, but if there were problems in childhood, the brain develops insecure attachments, whether anxious or avoidant.
Current science has gone a little further and has managed to measure the duration of this effect, confirming that what happens in the first years does not stay there, but rather dictates the architecture of our future relationships.
The trauma. A very recent study, published in 2025analyzed 1,404 university students using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire. The results are devastating for those who believe that romantic love is random, since the research found a chain effect where childhood trauma not only bothersbut rather negatively predicts romantic satisfaction in adulthood.
The most relevant finding of this study is mediation. The data statistically confirm that early traumatic experiences generate an insecure attachment, and it is this attachment style that triggers the low quality of the relationship that is formed. There is precisely a direct correlation that validates that, the greater the early injuries, the lower the neurological and emotional capacity to enjoy a partner, unless this mechanism is intervened.
From adolescence to adulthood. If the 2025 study offers us a snapshot of today, a work published in 2008 gives us the complete movie. In this case, research was done with 559 young people from Iowa to track the subjects from their adolescence to early adulthood.
The fascinating thing about this follow-up is how positive family interactions during adolescencecharacterized by warmth and low hostility, accurately predicted greater security of romantic attachment years later. This means that if the family environment resolved problems without aggression, the young person’s brain learned that this is the norm of intimacy, successfully replicating it with their partners in adult life. That is, much less toxic relationships were formed.
A dangerous pattern. Perhaps the hardest part of the recent evidence is that it links these patterns not only to unhappiness, but to violence. A specific study confirmed that an insecure attachment derived from “harsh parenting” and hostile parents directly correlates with aggression in adult couples. Basically, the conflict resolution patterns experienced at home are modeled and repeated.
In the same line, a study published in 2024 points out that repeated trauma alters internal models, increasing vulnerability. People with these wounds are not only at greater risk of aggression, but of tolerating abusive relationships because their internal danger “alarms” are out of calibration. Having normalized conflict since childhood, the brain does not identify toxicity as an immediate threat, but as a familiar environment.
Are we doomed? In these situations, it is logical to think that if you have had a tough childhood with a complicated family environment, then all future love relationships will be doomed to be toxic. But the reality is that no, since destiny is not written in stone, although it is engraved in the neurons.
The same study published in 2025 shed important light by discovering the social support clock, demonstrating that external support acts as a moderator capable of cushioning the impact of insecure attachment on the couple’s relationship.
Images | Mayur Gala
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