Ainsworth's Strange Situation

Ainsworth's Strange Situation

1. Key Terms

   • Separation anxiety - distress when infants separated from carer
   • Stranger Anxiety - stress when a stranger enters
   • Secure Base - has a emotional safe contact to come back to

2. Types of attach.

   • Insecure-avoidant
     • willing to explore
     • low stranger anx
     • low separation anx
     • avoid contact with carer's return
     • carer's are indifferent to baby's needs
   • Securely attached
     • keen to explore
     • high stranger anx
     • easy to calm
     • happy at return of carer
     • carer is sensitive to baby's needs
   • Insecure-resistant
     • unwilling to explore
     • high stranger and separation anx
     • seek and reject comfort at carer's return
     • carer sometime/sometimes sensitive to needs
       • conflicting feeling and behaviours

3. SS - see individual differences between mother and infant pairs w bonds

   • 8 episodes - 5 categories
   • Findings
     • infants explored playroom when mum present happily
       • less happy when stranger came or mum left
     • IA - ignored mother when she returned, little stress when left, most stressed when alone
     • SA - most played when mum there and didn't care about stranger, stress when she left, looked for comfort when she came back, calmed down easily
     • IR - fussy even with mum present, distressed when she left, wanted comfort when she came back but fought at the same time
   • sensitive responsiveness is a major factor in determining quality of attach.
   • Evaluation
     • a paradigm - scientific rigour
     • significance of parental sensitivity is backed up by other research in larger samples
     • assumed fixed characteristics - other factors like family circumstances
     • lacks ecological validity - very scripted and lab based
     • focuses too much on infant not mother's behaviour, distort the results
     • doesn't take into account of other attachment figures
     • reliable, repeated and same results
     • culturally biased
   • Culture variations
     • if bowlby's theory is right - attach patterns should be similar across the cultures
     • some cultures have one carer, others have many carers
     • Britain sees IA negatively BUT German sees positively, independence is valued
     • Japan and Israel have a high rate of IR (27%) - babies are rarely left alone
     • IA found in western cultures, IR found in Eastern
       • difference in pattern of attach across cultures but similar to Ainsworth
     • some cultures not represented (Africa or South USA)
     • Has imposed etic, (biased) analysed data from own culture beliefs