Attachment

Attachment

1. Infant Caregiver Interactions

   • Interactional Synchrony
     • When two people interact, they mirror each other in terms of facial and body movements, includes emotions and behaviours eg. you wave, they wave
   • Reciprocity
     • Responding to the action of another with a similar action Action of one partner elicits a response from the other partnereg. you wave, they smile
   • Evaluation
     • Cannot reliably test infant behaviour (an infants actions may be unpredictable or easily misinterpreted)
     • Other studies have failed to replicate the results (not wholly representative)
     • Valuable as it demonstrates the importance of imitative behaviour in social development (real life application)
     • Does not take into account individual differences
   • Meltzoff and Moore 1977

2. The Development of Attachment

   • The stages of attachment
     • 1. Asocial Stage (0-6 weeks)
       • Babies produce similar responses to people and objects Do not prefer specific people, bias towards human-like stimuli, prefer to look at face and eyes Rapidly learn to discriminate familiar to unfamiliar by voice and smell
     • 2. Indiscriminate Attachments (6 weeks - 6 months)
       • Babies become more sociable, can tell people apart, prefer human company Easily comforted by anyone, do not show a fear of strangers
     • 3. Specific Attachments (7 months onwards)
       • Baby begins to show separation + stranger anxiety
     • 4. Multiple Attachments(10, 11 months onwards)
       • Baby shows attachment behaviour towards several different people
   • Evaluation
     • Sample used by Shaffer and Emerson is biased, only represents mother-infant (mother may not be the primary attachment figure)
     • Debate relating to multiple attachments (Rutter= all attachment figures are equivalent and integrated to produce an overall attachment type) (Bowlby= infant forms one special attachment, all others are secondary)
     • Model can only be applied to individualist cultures (cultural variations, lacks validity)
     • Suggests development is inflexible, could cause concern etc
   • Schaffer and Emerson 1964

3. Animal Studies of Attachment

   • Imprinting
     • An innate readiness to develop a strong bond with the mother Takes place during a specific time in development
   • Lorenz 1935
   • Harlow 1959
   • Evaluation
     • Research is confounded by other studies (eg. Guiton 1966, leghorn chicks imprinted on gloves used to feed them)
     • Criticised due to its statement as 'irreversible' (Guiton 1966, could reverse imprinting by association with their own species)
     • In Harlows study, confounding variables were also present (lacks validity, does not accurately reflect the aims of the study)
     • Animals behave differently than humans do (not representative of real life human attachments)

4. Explanations of Attachment

   • The Learning Theory
     • Classical Conditioning
       • Learning through association
       • 1. Innate stimulus-response (food=UCS, pleasure=UCR)
         • 2. Neutral stimulus associated with the UCS (NS=mother)
           • 3. NS regularly associated with UCS (NS takes on properties of UCS, produces the same results)
             • 4. Ns becomes conditioned stimulus CS and produces a conditioned response CR
     • Operant Conditioning
       • Learning through reinforcement
       • 1. Infant fed = drive reduces = pleasure felt (positive reinforcement)
         • 2. Behaviour that led to being fed more likely to be repeated (food=primary reinforcer, person supplying food=secondary reinforcer)
           • 3. Attachment occurs as the child seeks the person who can supply the reward
     • Evaluation
       • Animals lack the innate predisposition and thinking power humans have (oversimplified, lack validity)
       • Limited view of attachment, (Harlow 's research shows an equal or greater preference to comfort rather than food)
       • Valuable as it does provide accurate information, although attentiveness and responsiveness could assist in the formation of attachments (not wholly representative)
   • Bowlby's Monotropic Theory
     • Assumes a similar process to imprinting operates in humans Attachment behaviour evolved to ensure survival
     • Evaluation
       • Ancestral needs would have dictated a need for an earlier attachment, whereas currently mothers carry their babies until they start crawling so a later attachment is formed (supporting adaptive attachments)
       • Confounded by other research (eg Harlow, spent significant time with one mother)
       • Suggest a 'sensitive period' rather than a 'critical period'
       • The temperament hypothesis (Kagan 1984) contradictory to Bowlby's theory

5. Types of Attachment

   • Ainsworth's Strange Situation

6. Cultural Variations in Attachment

   • The ways in which different groups vary in terms of their social practices and the effects these have on development and behaviour
   • Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg 1988
   • Collectivist Cultures
     • Emphasis on group effort and cooperation Value interdependence eg. Japan
   • Individualist Cultures
     • Emphasis on personal achievement Value independence eg. USA
   • Cultural Similarities
     • Tronick et al 1992 -African Tribe from Zaire who live in extended family groups.
       • Infants looked after and breastfed by different women, but slept with their own mother at night. At six months showed one primary attachment figure.
   • Cultural Differences
     • Grossmann and Grossmann 1991 - German infants tended to be classified as insecurely rather than securely attached
       • German culture involves keeping some interpersonal space between parents and children, so do not engage in proximity seeking behaviours in the strange situation
     • Takahashi 1990 studied 90 middle class Japanese infants and their mothers. No evidence of insecure-avoidant, high rates of insecure-resistant
       • Japanese culture means infants rarely experience separation from the mother

7. Bowlby's Theory of Maternal Deprivation

   • Deprivation
     • Refers to the loss of emotional care that is normally provided by a primary caregiver
   • 44 Juvenile Thieves
   • Evaluation
     • Real life application (hospital care has changed, visitation by parents etc)
     • Only tested physical deprivation, not psychological deprivation (55% w/ depressed parents were insecurely attached compared to 29% of non-depressed parents)
     • Supported by other studies eg. Bifulco (women who had experienced separation, 25% later experienced mental health problems)
     • Individual differences, securely attached more resistant than insecurely attached etc

8. Effects of Institutionalisation

   • Institutionalisation
     • The effects of institutional care on a childs development
   • Rutter and Songua-Barke 2010
     • Le Mare and Audet 2006
   • 1. Physical underdevelopment (Gardner 1972- deprivation dwarfism)
   • 2. Intellectual Under Functioning (Skodak and Skeels, when transferred to an institution w/ emotional care IQ scores improved by 30 points)
   • 3. Disinhibited Attachment (children do not discriminate between attachment figures, treat near strangers with inappropriate familiarity)
   • 4. Poor Parenting (Quinton et al 1984- compared 50 women raised in institutions to a group raised at home. In 20s, institutionalised were having severe difficulties parenting)
   • Evaluation
     • Individual differences