Moderating role of motivational preference in the relationship between attachment quality and emotional empathy among autistic caregivers

The study investigated the moderating role of motivational preference in the relationship between attachment quality and emotional empathy among sixty-five autistic caregivers (42 males and 23 females). Participants were drawn from Therapeutic Inclusive Nursery, Primary, and Secondary School in Abakpa Nike, Enugu State, Nigeria. Attachment Quality Scale, Work Preference Inventory Scale, and Emotional Empathy Scale were used in the study. Hayes PROCESS macro regression-based, path-analytical framework was employed to analyse the data. Motivational preference and the four dimensions of attachment quality predicted emotional empathy. Motivational preference did not moderate the relationship between security, avoidance and ambivalent worry dimensions of attachment quality and emotional empathy. Motivational preference moderated the relationship between ambivalent merger and emotional empathy (beta = -.14, t = -3.15, p = <.05). Ambivalent merger predicted emotional empathy for those with low motivational preference (beta = 7.22, p = <.05), moderate motivational preference (beta = 3.07, p = < .05), and for those with high motivational preference (beta = 1.01, p = <.05). Implications and limitations of the findings were discussed and suggestions for further studies were made.