attachment Flashcards
what is attachment?
- A two way emotional bond between two people (a caregiver and an infant) in which each an individual sees the other as essential for their own emotional security and development
- An attachment in humans takes a few months to develop
what leads to different styles of attachment?
It is the responsiveness of
the caregiver to the infants signals and needs that
leads to different styles of attachment
what does attachment begin with?
- interactions between babies and their caregivers
- also has important functions for the child’s development
what are two types of caregiver-infant interactions?
- reciprocity
- interactional synchrony
what is reciprocity?
- caregiver and infant interaction is a two-way process, each party responds to the other’s signals to sustain interaction (turn-taking)
- The behaviour of each party elicits a response from the other. i.e. when smiling at a baby, the baby will then smile back
- alert phases - feldman + edelman
what are alert phases? which study relates to this? when do interactions tend to be increasingly frequent?
- Babies have periods of ‘alert phases’ and signal to their mother that they are ready for interaction
- Feldman and Edelman (2007) found that mothers typically pick up on this signal and respond two-thirds of the time
- From around three months the interactions tend to be increasingly frequent and involves close attention to each other’s verbal signals and facial expressions
what is interactional synchrony?
- Mother and infant reflect both the actions and emotions of the other and do this in a co-ordinated synchronised way
- Their actions and emotions mirror one another perfectly in time
who observed the beginning of interactional synchrony in babies?
Meltzoff and Moore
what is the aim and procedure of meltzoff and moore?
- to investigate interactional synchrony between infants + caregivers
- controlled observation using 6 babies (12-27) + 12 babies (16-21)
- exposed to 4 diff stimuli - facial gestures + manual
- babies response recorded
- an independent observer (no knowledge of what infant seen) - asked to note instances of tongue protrusion + head movements using number of behaviour categories
- each observer scored tapes twice
what is are the findings + conclusions of meltzoff and moore?
- results indicated babies aged 12-27 days old could imitate both facial expressions + manual gestures
- concluded ability to imitate serves as important building block for later social + cognitive development - believed ability important for developing attachments
what is the importance of interactional synchrony? who showed this?
- believed that interactional synchrony is important for the development of mother-infant attachment
- Isabella et al. (1989) observed 30 mothers and infants together and assessed their degree of synchrony. They also assessed quality of attachment
- High levels of synchrony were associated with better quality mother -infant attachment
what are the different ways we can see attachment?
- Proximity – people try to stay physically close to those whom they are attached too
- Separation distress
- Secure base – even when we are independent of our attachment figure we tend to make regular contact with them (ex infants reg return to attachment figure when playing)
- Reunion behaviour – for a baby, they are happy to see their primary care giver again if they are separated
how do evans + porter support isabella et al when it comes to interactional synchrony?
- It has been suggested that interactional synchrony and reciprocity are important in developing
how do evans + porter support isabella et al when it comes to interactional synchrony?
- It has been suggested that interactional synchrony and reciprocity are important in developing
- studied reciprocity, interactional synchrony + attachment quality in 101 infants + mothers for first year of birth
- invited on 3 occasions (6,9,12) + babies in pairs played in observation room + videoed extent of reciprocity + degree of IR assessed
- 12 months quality of mother-infant attachment assessed using standard test ‘strange situation’ - those judged to be securely attached tended to be those who had most recip + IR
how is ethnocentric a limitation of evans and porter?
- all were recruited from American suburb - can be assumed to be predominantly white
- not very diverse sample size - can limit the application of research findings
what is the strength of filmed observations when it comes to attachment?
- can be recorded + analysed later - unlikely researchers will miss seeing key behaviors
- means observer can record data + establish inter-rater reliability of observations
- therefore data collected in research should have good reliability + validity
how is developmental importance a limitation of attachment?
- Feldman points out ideas like synchrony simply give names to patterns of observable caregiver + baby behaviors
- can be reliably observed but still may not be particularly useful in understanding child development - does not tell
purpose of these behaviors - therefore cannot be certain from observational research that recip + synchrony important for a child’s development
what did Schaffer + Emerson find about secondary attachments? what about fathers?
- found the majority of babies become attached to their mothers first (around 7 months)
- then create secondary attachments a few weeks/months later to other family members
- 75% of infants developed secondary attachments to their father by the age of 18 months
- was determined as the infants protested when their father walked away – a sign of attachment
who showed there to be a distinctive role of fathers in child development?
- grossmann et al
- conducted longitudinal study looking at both parents’ behavior + its relationship to their children’s attachment up until the children were in their teens
- quality of baby’s attachment with mothers but not fathers related to attachments in adolescence
- suggests attachment to fathers less important than mothers
- but also found quality of fathers play related to quality of adolescent attachments - suggests different role from mothers - more play stimulation - less emotional development
what is primary attachment?
- first
- has special emotional significance
- baby’s relationship with their primary attachment figure forms basis of all later close emotional relationships
who conducted research into fathers as primary attachment figures? what was the procedure + findings + conlcusions?
- field
- filmed 4-month old babies in face-to-face interactions with primary care giver mothers, primary care giver fathers, and secondary care giver fathers
- primary caregiver fathers, like PC mothers - spent more time smiling, imitating + holdings babies than secondary caregiver fathers
- these actions all part of recip + interact - part of process for attachment formation
- fathers potential to be more emotion-focused primary attachment figure
how is conflicting evidence a limitation of research into the role of fathers?
- findings may vary according to the methodology used
- grossmann - longitudinal - suggested fathers as secondary attachment figures important + distinct role - play + stimulation
- but if fathers distinctive + important role - children in single-mother/ lesbian families to turn out different to hetero families
- MacCallum and Golombok found this was untrue - whether fathers have distinctive role unanswered
