AO3 - Strange Situations

AO3 - Strange Situations

1. Strength

   • P: Observations have high reliability
     • E: Observations such as S.S can be subjective and so high inter-rater reliability is crucial. Ainsworth found almost perfect agreement when rating exploratory behaviour - .94 agreement between raters.
       • E: Demonstrates almost unanimous agreement among observers about behaviour of infants
         • L: Increases reliability of the theory about 3 types of attachment developed from the S.S observation

2. Limitation

   • P: Ainsworth has not accounted for a key fourth type of attachment
     • E: Main and Solomon (1986) analysed over 200 S.S tapes and proposed a type D attachment, insecure-disorganised
       • E: Lack of consistent social behaviour and attachment. No coherent strategy for dealing with stress of separation. Strong attachment followed by avoidance or fear towards caregiver
         • L: Ainsworth did not account for this attachment = her research on attachment lacking sufficient detail. Reducing validity

3. Limitation

   • P: Too focused on the one relationship between the carer and infant being assessed
     • E: Main and Weston found that children behaved differently based on which parent they were with
       • E: Instead of measuring a child's general attachment tendencies, S.S just assessing quality of relationship between one carer and the child
         • L: Reduces internal validity as it was not measuring what it intended to