Attachment and separation are concepts that depict the struggle within individuals between isolated self and involvement with others. Many authors have written about this struggle in a variety of terms. The theory evaluated by this study was elaborated by C. Gilligan (1982). It postulated that there existed two views of life experiences: one based on justice, rights, equality, reciprocity, separation, and individuation; and one based on connections, attachment, care, and relationships. These views were named "two modes of thought" but were related generally to men and women respectively. This thesis investigated Gilligan's postulates that men progress from a fear of intimacy (affiliation) to recognition of its importance while women accept affiliation initially and remain constant in valuing it across the life span. The Edwards Personal Preference Schedule was used to obtain self-reported values for affiliation and identity-strength. Subjects included 136 female and 69 male college students at a midwestern university, ranging in age from 21 to 54 years of age. The effect of affiliation strength was evaluated for age, gender, identity strength, and marital status. The results indicated a statistically significant interaction between age and gender for affiliation strength. This confirmed Gilligan's postulate that young men value affiliation less than young women. The results did not confirm the Gilligan postulates that women are constant in valuing affiliation over the life span, and that men become more affiliative with age. Instead, a significant decline was noted in affiliation for women between age groups 20-28 and 40-55 years. Unmarried subjects had higher affiliation strength scores than married subjects. (LLL)