Attachment Flashcards
Attachment
A two way emotional bond between two individuals in which both sees the other as essential for their own emotional security.
Reciprocity
Describes how two people interact with each other, means two way e.g. how mother and baby respond to each other signals
Interactional synchrony
Interaction that mother and baby have is coordinated, they mirror each other. Synchronised reactions.
Primary caregiver
The parent with whom the child(ren) spend the majority of their time with.
A social stage
0-6 weeks, infants respond to people and things with a positive reaction
Indiscriminate attachment
Refers to the tendency of an individual to form attachments to any available caregiver or source of support regardless of quality or suitability of support.
Specific attachment
Baby looks to particular people for security, comfort and protection. Shows fear of strangers and unhappiness when separated from ‘special person’.
Multiple attachments
Attachments to two or more people. Most babies are able to form this.
Stranger anxiety
Manifested by crying when an unfamiliar person approaches. Linked with infants developmental rash of distinguishing the familiar from the unfamiliar
Separation anxiety
An exaggeration of otherwise developmentally typical anxiety manifested by excessive concern, worry and even dread of the actual or anticipated separation from attachment figure.
Imprinting
Occurs when an animal forms an attachment to the first thing it sees upon hatching. (Lorenz)
Ethology
The study of animal behaviour
Sexual imprinting
Form of learned mate preference for a trait that an individual has observed in its population. Acquired during early stages of life.
Critical period
The time during which a given behaviour is especially susceptible to, and requires specific environmental influences to develop normally
Contact comfort
Sense of ease that an infant experiences when they are in physical contact with parental figures
Learning theory
Behaviourist explanation that suggests that attachments develop through classical and/or operant conditioning.
Cupboard love theory
The infant attaches to the caregiver who provides food (Harlow)
Primary drive
Directly related to survival and include the need for food, water and oxygen.
Secondary drive
Culturally determined or learned, such as the drive to obtain money, intimacy or social approval.
Monotropic (theory)
Belief that infants are born with the innate need to create one main and special bond with their attachment figure.
Law of continuity
Theory that people usually perceive objects so that a series of visual elements belong together, and form a continuous line or pattern
Law of accumulated separation
For there to be no future problems and the attachment to be secure and healthy, there should be no separation between the mother and the infant.
