Psychology: Attachment

Psychology: Attachment

1. Caregiver-Infant Interactions

   • Reciprocity
     • Babies move in a basic rhythm co-ordinating actions with their caregiver
       • Babies will not imitate anything has to be social stimuli
   • Interactional Synchrony
     • Meltzoff and Moore suggested that babies imitate specific gestures modelled by adults
       • Failure to replicate. Problem may lie with procedure rather than ability
         • 'Like me' Hypothesis. Make connection with model to project onto own experiences
     • Difficult to test infant behaviour as mouths in constant motion
   • Real or Pseudo-Imitation
     • Piaget believed that behaviour was not real imitation only developed towards end of first year. Anything before was 'response training'.
     • Video monitor experiment showed active partner and behaviour may be innate
       • If strongly attached show better synchrony

2. Development of Attachment

   • 1. Indiscriminate
     • Show interactional synchrony. Same response to all
       • Cultural Variations
         • Individualistic focus on individual first. Collectivist more focused on needs of the group. Expect multiple to be more common
   • 2. Beginnings
     • Prefer human company - knows familiar people. Easily comforted
   • 3. Discriminate
     • Separation Anxiety, reunion joy and stranger anxiety
   • 4. Multiple
   • KEY STUDY: SCHAFFER AND EMERSON
     • 1960s Working class in Glasgow. Mother observe child response to different stimuli and evaluate distress
       • Unreliable data due to biased sample
   • Role of the Father
     • Secondary Attachment. Provides challenging situations and cognitive demands
       • Bowlby said only 1 main attachment. Rutter argued all equivalent
       • Stage Theories are inflexible

3. Animal Studies

   • Harlow
     • Cloth covered mother to monkeys spent more time with. Contact comfort not food
       • Can't generalise
     • Socially and Sexually abnormal after
       • Confounding variable: mothers heads different
       • Ethics
   • Lorenz
     • Gosling's imprinted on him.
       • Irreversible process and long-lasting
       • Replicated with leghorn chicks Support
       • Thought to be more plastic and forgiving. Can be reversed

4. Learning Theory

   • Classical Conditioning
     • Innate-stimulus response. Food is UCS & pleasure UCR. NS paired with UCS produces CR
     • Research with animals can't be generalised
   • Operant Conditioning
     • Drive to reduce discomfort. Pleasure = positive reinforcement (repeated)
       • Contact comfort more important than food proven by Harlow
       • Alternative of Bowlby's theory - WHY attachments form
     • Negative Reinforcement: Taking away discomfort
       • Infant learn through association as well = due to attention
       • Drive reduction theory largely ignored can't explain thrill

5. Bowlby's Theory

   • Critical Period
     • Innate drive to be attached. 3-6 months optimal. After 6 months difficult to form.
       • Adaptive. Less critical for survival. EEA vital become attached soon as possible
       • Alternative: Temperment Hypothesis - Kagan
   • Social Releasers
     • Smiling elicit caregiving. Innate
       • Sensitive rather than critical period. Less likely to form but not impossible
   • Monotropy
     • One special bond more than others. Primary Attachment figure. Hierarchy
   • Continuity Hypothesis
     • Strongly attached = social and emotionally competent
   • Internal Working Model

6. Ainsworth: Strange Situation

   • Measured: Separation Anxiety, Reunion Joy, Stranger Anxiety and new environment
   • 1. Secure
     • Harmonious and co-operative. Distress when left easily comforted and soothed
       • Found 4th Type: Insecure-Disorganised no consistent patterns
       • Maternal Reflective Functioning: Ability to understand what thinking central in attachment
   • 2. Insecure-Avoidant
     • Avoid social interaction and intimacy. Little response to separation. No proximity seeking or resist and cling
       • High Inter-Observer Reliability
       • `Real-World Application: Better care provided for children by caregivers taught to understand better
       • Low Internal Validity: Could be measuring relationship type not attachment
   • 3. Insecure- Resistant
     • Seeks and Resists intimacy. Separation =distress. Reunion conflicting desires

7. Cultural Variations: Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg

   • Meta-Analysis: 8 countries.
     • Differences small between countries. Secure most common type. Variation within cultures more
       • Tools used e.g. intelligence related to cultural assumptions. Lack ecological validity. Beta bias
       • Cultural Bias. Experiment rooted in American culture and individuation. Beta Bias
         • Produce indigenous psychologists
     • Innate and biological
   • Cultural Similarities
     • Infants in African tribe raised as a group still showed one primary attachment figure
       • Not innate mass media spread ideas
   • Cultural Differences
     • German more insecure type. Different childrearing. Encouraged independence.
     • Japan not experience separation so no evidence of insecure-avoidant
       • Nation rather than culture. Countries have different subcultures. More rural = insecure-resistant

8. Maternal Deprivation

   • 44 Juvenile Thieves
     • Children at clinic emotionally Mal-adjusted
     • Lack normal signs of affection or shame
       • Physical and Emotional Separation assume physical separation cause but no emotional care also harming factor
     • Experienced consistent early separation
       • Post War thinking of care for children changed. Major social change
   • Value of Maternal Care
     • Assumed good standard of food and care was enough. Not true
       • Support long-term effects not always negative outcome increased likelihood
   • Critical period
     • Denied care because of separation became emotionally disturbed
       • Not all children affected in same way. Securely attached cope well
       • Deprivation (Loss of attachment due to separation) vs Privation (Fails to develop bond)
   • Long Term
     • Deprivation emotional maladjustment or mental health problems

9. Romanian Orphans: Institutionalisation

   • 165 Romanian Children. Adopted at different ages
     • Tested for physical, cognitive and social development
       • Recovery possible by 4
     • Lagged behind British counterparts mentally retarded
       • May just be slow development disappear over time learn how to cope
   • Physical Underdevelopment
     • Deprivation Dwarfism
       • Deprivation only one factor: Poor health and lack of cognitive stimulation
     • Large benefits for longitudianls studies -show effects disappear after time
   • Intellectual Underfunctioning
     • Mentally retarded
   • Disinhibited attachment
     • Some children not as strongly affected - Received special treatment
   • Poor Parenting
     • Improving lives of children in hospital care - Importance early adoption

10. Early Influences

    • Hazan and Shaver Love Quiz
      • Ask about current attachment and history
        • Retrospective Classification memories not always accurate when asking adults
          • Alternative explanation property of relationship not individual
      • Pattern of attachment followed infancy with secure most common
        • Overly determinist: Fixed effect on later relationships. Doomed
      • Secure more happy and trusting
        • Low Correlations not strong attachment not stable
    • Childhood Friendships
      • Securely attached less isolated and more popular
      • Internal Working model higher expectations
    • Poor Parenting
      • Lack of internal working model no reference point to parent from
    • Romantic Relationships
      • Securely attached longer relationships
        • Research correlational no cause and effect. temperament confounding variable
    • Mental health
      • No model inability to relate and interact