Attachment

Question 1

Define Bowlby’s attachment theory.

Answer 1

This theory proposes that the emotional and social development of an infant is profoundly shaped by their relationship with their primary caregivers.

Question 2

What is Bowlby’s critical period?

Answer 2

Bowlby suggested that if a child does not form an attachment before the age of 3.5 years (30 months) then an attachment would never occur. He later revised his theory and proposed a sensitive period (where an attachment can still form, although it takes longer) of up to 5 years.

Question 3

What is reciprocity?

Answer 3

When a child and their primary giver respond to each other’s actions.

Question 4

What is interactional synchrony?

Answer 4

When an infant mirrors the actions of another person (their primary caregiver).

Question 5

What are the attachment types?

Answer 5

(Type B) secure, (Type A) insecure-avoidant, (Type C) insecure-resistant.

and insecure-disorganized.

Question 6

What is the behaviour of an insecure-avoidant child?

Answer 6

Insecure-avoidant children avoid attachment with their primary giver showing minimal stranger or separation anxiety.

Question 7

What is the behaviour of an insecure-resistant child?

Answer 7

Insecure-resistant children show high stranger and separation anxiety, overly clingy to their primary caregiver.

Question 8

What is the behaviour of a secure child?

Answer 8

Securely attached children use their primary caregiver as a base point to explore from, they show some stranger and separation anxiety and are most at ease when with their primary caregiver.

Question 9

What is privation?

Answer 9

When a child never had an emotional attachment with a caregiver.

Question 10

Outline the learning theory of attachment?

Answer 10

People get attached by classical conditioning for food.

Question 11

What are the 4 main effects of institutionalisation?

Answer 11

Physical underdevelopment,
Poor parenting,
Disinhibited attachment,
Intellectual under-functioning

Question 12

What are the stages of attachment?

Answer 12

1. Asocial stage (first few weeks)
2. Indiscriminate attachment (6 weeks - 7 months)
3. Specific attachment stage (approximately 7-9 months more 7 tho)
4. Multiple attachment stage (approximately 10 months onwards)

Question 13

What did Harlow’s monkey study find?

Answer 13

Contact comfort > Food (Monkeys spent more time with cloth mothers only going to wire mother to feed.

Question 14

What did Lorenz find?

Answer 14

Animals have an innate ability to imprint on the first moving object they see.

Question 15

What did Feild find?

Answer 15

Feild found that the father engages in a more playful and recreational role normally

Question 16

Which study did Rutters conduct what were the findings?

Answer 16

The Romanian orphans study.

• Had disinhibited attachment
• Physically smaller
• Cognitively less developed

Question 17

What were the attachment percentages in Japan?

Answer 17

The findings were that 68% of Japanese infants were securely attached, 32% were insecure-resistant, and no infants were insecure-avoidant.

Question 18

What did McCallum and Golombok research and find?

Answer 18

They found that children growing up in same-sex couples did not develop any differently to those growing up in conventional families.

Question 19

How does the learning theory explain attachment?

Answer 19

Food conditions babies into forming an attachment with their primary caregiver (classical conditioning)

Question 20

What were the findings of Bowlby’s 44 thieves study?

Answer 20

14 children from the theft group were identified as affectionless psychopaths; 12 of those had experienced prolonged separation of more than six months from their mothers in their first two years of life, whereas only 5 of the 30 children not classified as affectionless psychopaths had experienced separations.