Attachment

Question 1

Strengths of Interactional Synchrony

Answer 1

• Study observed the beginnings of interactional synchrony with babies only 2 weeks old mirroring facial expressions
• Study observed 30 babies and their mothers.
  The degree of synchrony and quality of mother-infant interactions was measured.
  High levels of synchrony were associated with better quality of attachment.
• Highly valid results.
  Because they can be recorded from many angles without their knowledge so their response remains natural and does not change.

Question 2

Weaknesses of Interactional Synchrony

Answer 2

• Observing infants is difficult.
  Because only hand movements and facial expressions are being observed and it is difficult to be certain whether these observations are actually taking place from the infant’s perspective.
• Research conducted on interactional synchrony does not tell us the purpose.

Question 3

Strengths of Schaffer’s Study

Answer 3

• Good external validity
  Study carried out in families homes
  Observed by parents during ordinary activities
  Behaviour of baby is not impacted by observer
  Natural behaviour was retained
• Longitudinal study and high internal validity
  Same children were followed up and observed regularly
  High internal validity
  As it was the same children, there were no confounding variables e.g participant variables

Question 4

Weaknesses of Schaffer’s Study

Answer 4

• Limited sample
  All families were from the same district
  All families were from the same socio economic cohort
  Conducted a long time ago
  Results cannot be genralised easily to all social and historic contexts

Question 5

Weaknesses of Schaffer’s Stages of Attachment

Answer 5

• Difficult to study the asocial stage as it is difficult to make judgements about babies behaviour so evidence cannot be relied on
• Conflicting evidence on when multiple attachments develop
  Bowlby suggests attachment to a single main carer before deveeloping multiple attachments
  Collectivist cultures have multiple caregivers as the norm
  Hence, psychologists believe that these children form multiple attachments from the outset
• No definite way to measure multiple attachments vs play mates

Question 6

Weaknesses of Lorenz’s Study

Answer 6

• Cannot be generalised to humans as mammalian attachment is different to birds.
  For example, mammalian mothers show more affection and mammals may be able to form attachments at any point in life.
• Study found that chickens imprinted on yellow washing up gloves would try and mate with them as adults(as Lorenz predicted), but with experience, they learnt to mate with other chickens. This shows that sexual imprinting is not permanent as Lorenz believed.

Question 7

Strengths of Harlow’s Study

Answer 7

• Real life applications.
  Profound effect on psychologists’ understanding on mother-infant attachment.
  Showed that attachment did not develop due to being fed by the mother but due to contact comfort.
• Had practical applications like helping social workers understand the risk factors in child neglect and abuse and so intervene to prevent it.
  Also helped us understand the importance of proper attachment figures for monkeys in zoos.

Question 8

Weaknesses of Harlow’s Study

Answer 8

• Ethical issues are there as the monkeys suffered greatly.
  The species is considered similar enough for findings to be generalised to humans which also means that their suffering is also as serious.
  Harlow referred to the wire mothers as ‘iron maidens’.

Question 9

Weaknesses of Learning Theory Exaplaining Attachment

Answer 9

• Evidence from animal research.
  a) Lorenz’ study on geese showed that the geese imprinted before they were fed and maintained these attachments regardless of who fed them.
  b) Furthermore, Harlow’s study in monkeys showed that they attached to the cloth mother in preference to the wire mother despite her dispensing milk.
  Both these studies show that attachment does not develop as a result of feeding.
• Research from human infants shows that feeding does not appear to be an important factor in humans.
  a) Schaffer and Emerson showed that many babies developed a primary attachmnet to their biological mother even if other carers did most of the feeding.
  b) Isabella et al found that quality of attachment is associated with reciprocity and interactional synchrony so these findings do not reconcile with the idea of ‘cupboard love’.

Question 10

Strengths of Bowlby’s Theory Explaining Attachment

Answer 10

• Evidence for social releases.
  Study reported the existence of interactional synchrony.
  Observation showed that babies were in distress when mothers ignored them.
• Support for internal working model.
  Study shows that mothers who classified their attachment with their parents as poor, were more likely to have children classified as poorly attached according to observations.
  It supports the internal working model.

Question 11

Weaknesses of Bowlby’s Theory Explaining Attachment

Answer 11

• Schaffer and Emerson.
  They found that babies did attach to one person first but also many babies could also form multiple attachments at the same time.
• Suess et al (1992) found that attachment to mother is more important in predicting later behaviour.
  However, this could simply mean that attachment to the primary figure is stronger, but not different in quality.

Question 12

Strengths of The Strange Situation

Answer 12

• Support for validity
  Attachment type defined by Ainsworth is strongly predictive of later development.
  Babies assessed as ‘secure attachment’ type go on to have better outcomes in life e.g relationships, friendships etc.
  Whereas, insecure resistant attachment is associated with the worst outcomes including:
  a) Bullying (Kokkinos)
  b) Mental health problems (Ward et al)
• Good reliability
  Shows good inter - rater reliability.
  Other observers agreed on which attachment type to classify the babies into.
  This is perhaps due to the controlled environment and behavioural categories are easy to observe.
  Bick et al looked at inter - rater reliability in a group of trained Strange Situation observers and found agreement on 94% of tested babies.
  So, we can be confident that classification into attachment types is not dependent on who is observing them.

Question 13

Weaknesses of The Strange Situation

Answer 13

• The test may be cultural bound.
  Culture differences in childhood experiences are likely to mean that children respond differently to the Strange Situation
  Caregivers from different cultures also respond differently in the Strange Situation
  E.g Japanese mothers are rarely ever separated from their babies so there are very high levels of separation anxiety in Japan.
  Also upon reunion, mothers rushed in to attend to the babies, so it was hard to observe the baby’s response.
• Kagan et al suggested that attachment type is related to temperament of the child rather than the relationship with the primary attachment figure.
  Hence, the Strange Situation lacks validity as it is not measuring attachment but is simply measuring anxiety of the child.

Question 14

Strengths of Studying Cultural Variations in Attachment

Answer 14

• Very large samples
  Large samples increase internal validity
  This reduces the impact of anomalous results

Question 15

Weaknesses of Studying Cultural Variations in Attachment

Answer 15

• Samples tend to be unrepresentative of cultures
  The comparison is actually between countries, not cultures.
  Within any country, there are many different cultures with different child rearing practices.
  The particular cultural characteristics and the caregiving styles of the sample need to be specified.
• Method of assessment is biased
  The strange situation was designed by an American researcher(Ainsworth) based on a British theory(Bowlby’s).
  Trying to apply this theory from 1 culture to another is known as imposed etic.
  E.g lack of separation anxiety and pleasure upon reunion may be indicated as an insecure attchment in the Strange Situation.
  However, it may be seen as a sign of independence rather than avoidance in Germany.

Question 16

Weaknesses of Bowlby’s 44 Thieves Study

Answer 16

• Evidence may be poor
  Bowlby drew on a number of sources of evidence for maternal deprivation.
  This included studies of children orphaned during the 2nd world war.
  This is flawed as evidence as war orphans were traumatised and often had poor after care, so they may have been the cause of developmentational difficulties rather than separation.
  Furthermore, the 44 thieves study has major design flaws like bias.
  Bowlby himself carried out the assessment for affection-less psychopathy and the family interviews, knowing what he hoped to find.
• Counter evidence
  Not all reserach supports Bowlby’s findings.
  Hilda Lewis conducted the 44 thieves study on a larger scale.
  This included 500 young people.
  In her sample, a history of early prolonged separation from the mother did not predict criminality or difficulty forming close relationships.
  This is a problem because it means that other factors can impact the outcome of early maternal deprivation.
• The critical period is a sensitive period
  Bowbly believed that the time was ‘critical’ because prolonged separation inevitably caused damage within that period.
  However, the damage has actually been proven to not be inevitable.
  Case of twin boys isolated from the age of 18 months until 7 years old.
  After the age of 7, they were looked after by 2 loving adults and they recovered completely.
  So the period is ‘sensitive’ not ‘critical’.

Question 17

Strengths of Romanian Orphans Study - The Effect of Institutionalism

Answer 17

• Real life application
  Studying Romanian orphans has enhanced our understanding of the effects of instituitionalisation.
  Resulting in improvements to the way children are cared for in institutions.
  Now orphanages ensure that there are only 1 or 2 people playing a central role for each child.
  This person is a key worker.
  This helps children develop normal attachments and avoid disinhibited attachments.
• Fewer extraneous variables than other orphan studies
  Many orphan studies before Romanian orphans involved children who had experienced a loss or trauma before they were instituitionalised.
  It was hard to measure the impacts of instituitionalisation in isolation as there were multiple factors that the children were dealing with causing confounding participant variables.
  In the Romanian orphan study, it was possible to study the impacts of institutionalisation without such variables increasing the internal validity of the study.

Question 18

Weaknesses of Romanian Orphans Study - The Effect of Institutionalism

Answer 18

• Low genralisability
  The Romanian orphans were not typical.
  They had particularly poor standards of care and extremely low levels of intellectual stimulation.
  This is a limitation because the unusual situational variables means that the study may lack generalisability.

Question 19

Strengths of The Internal Working Model

Answer 19

• Attachmmnet type has an impact on romantic partners later in adulthood.
  Gerard McCarthy
  Hazan & Shaver
• People tend to base their parenting style on their internal working model.
  Bailey et al

Question 20

Weaknesses of The Internal Working Model

Answer 20

• It predicts continuity between security of infact attachment and later relationships.
  Evidence for this is mixed.
  McCarthy supports this continuity
  Zimmerman found a very little relationship between quality of infant and adolescent attachment
• Issues with validity.
  Most studies of attachment concerned with continuity do not make use of the Strange Situation.
  They assess mother - infant attachment by interviews or questionnaires not in infancy but later years.
  This creates a validity problem.
  It relies on accurate recollections.
• An association does not mean causality.
  Infant attachments may be associated with certain traits but this does not mean that they cause them.
  There may be a 3rd environmental factor like parenting style or child’s temperament.
  These may influence both infact attachment and quality of later relationships.
  This is a limitation because it is counter to Bowlby’s view that the internal working model causes later outcomes.
• Kagan et al suggested that attachment type is related to temperament of the child rather than the relationship with the primary attachment figure.
  Hence, the Strange Situation lacks validity as it is not measuring attachment but is simply measuring anxiety of the child.