The Ideal Parent Figures (IPF) Protocol (aka: IPF Meditation) is one of the 3 pillars of attachment repair, used to heal attachment wounds — as described by Harvard psychologists David S. Elliott and Daniel P. Brown in the textbook  Attachment Disturbances in Adults: Treatment for Comprehensive Repair.

Pillar 1 employs a conversational guided meditation — a back-and-forth collaboration between the participant and therapist — as the participant deeply relaxes, imagining themselves as a young child having vivid, nurturing experiences with ideal parent figures that embody the ten ingredients of attachment security, and respond according to the participants attachment needs.

Pillar 2 develops the participants Metacognition or Mentalizing capacity (similar to Vipassana Meditation), and Pillar 3 provides a practical understanding of the nature of collaborative and secure relationships. The three approaches weave together in each session, with an early emphasis on collaboration.

Early research shows a shift into attachment security after 35-50 hours of IPF Meditation with a provider who shares session recordings for between-visit listening. Attachment Security was measured using the AAI (Adult Attachment Inventory).

Therapeutic models are considered effective with a treatment effect size of 0.8. The treatment effect size of IPF guided-meditation is 6.23 (Cohen).