Attachment Flashcards

Question

Argument of fathers not being ‘caregivers’ but the are ‘playmates’

Answer 1

-grossman et al found that the quality of attachment with the father was less important for future development than the quality of attachments with the mother. - but fathers play related to quality adolescent attachment suggests their role in attachments is more to do with play than emotional care.

Answer 2

-evidence suggests when fathers did rake on the role of being the main caregiver, they adopt behaviours more typical of mothers. -field found that primary caregiver fathers spent more time smiling, imitating and holding babies than secondary caregiver fathers, all behaviours in building a primary (emotional) attachment. - therefore fathers can adopt a more ‘emotional role’.

Answer 3

P- findings into the role of the father can be used to offer reassuring advise to parents E- research showing fathers can be valid maternal figures may be a comfort for some families who would otherwise have faced a hard choice on who would give up work if the mother was primary earner. This encourages more fathers to take primary caregiver role whilst mother returns to job, boosting economy. C- this means that parental anxiety about the role of fathers can be reduced and parental decisions made easier.

Answer 4

P-confusion over research questions when investigating the role of the father E-because some psychologists want to understand the role of the father simply as secondary attachment figures behind the mother. Other researchers however look at the father as the primary attachment figure equal to importance of mother. Former has seen fathers as behaving different to mothers but later has seen fathers take on a ‘maternal’ role C-psychologists can’t easily answer the simple question- what is the role of the father? P-conflicting evidence from different methodologies E- grossman et al suggests fathers have a distinct role in children’s development involving play and stimulation however mccallum found children without a father do not develop differently C-means question whether fathers have a distinctive role in attachment remains unanswered C-however findings may not conflict- fathers may take on particular roles in two parent families whereas other family structures adapt to not having fathers. So findings may be clear. P-issues of observer bias within research into this area E-the researchers preconceptions about how father behave may influence their observations when studying fathers. Researchers sees what they expect to see due to expected stereotypes of fathers e.g. that they are more playful C- effect internal validity of research m,earning studies may not actually be measuring the true role of father within families

Answer 5

Lorenz-imprinting Harlow-importance of contact comfort

Answer 6

Lorenz randomly divided a large clutch of goose eggs -one half were hatched with the mother goose in their natural environment -the other half were hatched in an incubator where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz They mixed the goslings together to see whom they would follow Lorenz also observed birds and their later courtship behaviour

Answer 7

The incubator group followed Lorenz everywhere (imprinted on him) whereas the other group followed their mother around Also sexual imprinting- birds acquire a template of the desirable characteristics required in a mate- permanent effect on mating behaviour. conclusion- there is a critical period imprinting needs to happen during a certain time after birth otherwise chicks do not attachment themself to a mother figure

Answer 8

P- the fact he did this research on birds means there is difficulty relating his findings to humans E-it is suggested that human attachment is quite different (and more complex) compared to attachment formed in birds e.g. mammalian mothers may show more emotional attachment to their young than birds do. C- therefore it might not be appropriate to generalise his findings to explain human attachments P- some of Lorenz conclusions have been questioned by psychologists E- guiton et al found chickens who imprinted on yellow washing up gloves would try and mate with them as adults, but with experience they eventually learned to prefer to mate with other chickens. C-this suggests that the impact of imprinting on mating behaviour is not as permanent as Lorenz suggested therefore his conclusions may lack validity.

Answer 9

Harlow reared 16 rhesus monkeys with two wire model ‘mothers’ Condition 1- plain wire mother- dispensed milk Condition 2- cloth covered mother- no milk To measuring attachment behaviours he observed how the mon keys reached when placed in frightening situations Harlow and his colleagues also continued to study the monkeys who had been deprived of their real mother into adulthood

Answer 10

Short term- baby monkeys cuddled the soft cloth mother in preference to the cloth mother in preference to the wire one that provide food siggesting that contact comfort is more important than food when it comes to attachment behaviour. Long term- Harlow followed these monkeys into adulthood and found they has severe problems- more aggressive, less sociable and less skilled in mating as deprived from real mother.

Answer 11

P-his findings had a profound effect on our understanding of attachment E- Harlow showed how important contact comfort was for child’s healthy development and how early attachments influence our later social development This has helped social workers understand risk factors in child neglect and abuse such as lack of comfort. C- so thanks to Harlow we have a greater understanding of what we need to do/avoid to ensure healthy childhood development.

Answer 12

P- Harlow received severe criticisms/backlash for his research E- the monkeys in his study suffered greatly from what he did to them, causing them permanent damage and Harlow was fully aware of the suffering this was causing to them. C-this is a concern as monkeys are considered a close enough species to generalise findings from therefore it has been argued that their suffering would be human like and therefore unethical

Answer 13

The learning theory suggests that attachment develops through the process of classical and operant conditioning. This is sometimes called the cupboard love explanation because it emphasises the importance of food in attachment formation

Answer 14

According to the learning theory the baby has to learn to form an attachment with his mother By the process of CC the baby forms an association between the mother (neural stimulus) and the feeling of pleasure that comes from being fed (an innate unconditioned response) at first the baby simply feels comforted by food, UCS. However each time they are fed the mother is there too. They quickly associate the mother with the pleasure of being fed. Before long the mother stimulates a feeling of pleasure on her own even without food which means the baby feels happier (CR) when the mother is near. It’s begging of attachment.

Answer 15

When the baby cries (wants food) it leads to response from the caregiver (feeding) Here positive reinforcement can take place for the infant as if the caregiver provides correct response, crying is reinforced (rewarded as pleasurable outcome) and caregiver is rewarded by the infant being happy. Negative reinforcement can also happen for the infant as thanks to the caregiver an unpleasant situation has been removed- no longer hungry. And the caregiver is reinforced as their crying stopped- avoids something unpleasant.

Answer 16

P-some elements of conditioning could still be involved (just not to do with food) E-it seems unlikely that association with food is central to attachment, however conditioning may still play a role in attachment for example a baby’s choice of primary attachment figure may be determined by the fact the caregiver becomes associated with warm and comfort C- this means that conditioning could still be important in choice of attachment figures though not the process of attachment formation

Answer 17

P- one limitation of learning theory is counter evidence from animal studies E- Lorenz geese imprinted on the first moving object they saw. Harlows monkeys attached to a cloth mother in preference to a wire mother that dispensed milk. In both of these studies attachment/imprinting did not develop as a result of feeding. C- this shows that factors other than feeding are important in attachment formation, at least in animals. P- a range of human studies have also shown feeding is not the most important factor in human attachments. E- for example Schaffer and Emerson showed that for many babies their main attachment was not to the person who fed them it was about the general needs. Isabella et al found that interactional synchrony (unrelated to feeding) predicted attachment quality. C- therefore further suggests that other factors are more important in attachment formation than feeding P- to improve this theory researchers have proposed a newer explanation for infant-caregiver attachment based on social learning theory. E- hay and vespo suggest that parents reach children to love them by modelling attachment behaviours e.g. hugging and kissing. Also if children see older siblings rewarded for these behaviours, this could vicariously reinforce them to do the same, strengthening the attachment. C-this means the SLT provides a better explanation for attachment than CC.

Answer 18

Attachment in adaptive Babies are born with social releases Critical period Monotropic Internal working model

Answer 19

Attachment is an innate (born) process whereby infant and carers are programmed to become attached. This gives a survival advantage as young babies need to be close to caregivers for protection

Answer 20

Bowlby suggests babies are born with innate ‘cute’ behaviours These encourage attention from adults and activate the adult attachment system-adults feel love to baby

Answer 21

Bowlby suggested that there is a critical period of around 2 years within which the child needs to form an attachment.- more sensitive up to 6 months. If the attachment is not formed within this time then the child will find it much harder to form one at a later date

Answer 22

One particular attachment is more special and intense than the others and is one of central importance to the child’s development Law of continuity- more consistent a child’s care- better quality attachment Law of accumulated seperation- the effects of everyt situation add up so the safest dose is therefore zero dose

Answer 23

The first (monotropic) attachment forms an internal working model of relationships This serves as a ‘template’ for what relationships are like and may affect their relationship towards others and their own children in the future

Answer 24

P-supporting evidence for the role of the social releasers E-brazelton et al instructed primary attachment figures to ignore their babies signals e.g. smiling, cooing. Babies (who were previously shown t be normally responsive) initially showed some distress but eventually curled up motionless. C- this supports the idea that social releasers play an important rile in attachment development as Bowlby states P-there is also supporting evidence for bowlbys idea of an internal working model E-bailey et al studies 99 mothers finding those with poor attachments to their own parents were more likely to have one year olds who were poorly attached. C- this suggests that he was accurate in his idea of early attachments influencing future relationships and are ultimately passed on through generations C-however there are other influences on social development. For example a babies genetically influences personality is important in the development of social behaviour, including later parenting style this suggests Bowlby overemphasised the importance of the internal working model.

Answer 25

P-the concept of monotrophy lacks validity E- for example other family members may develop attachments with the baby that have the same qualities such as comfort and secure base from which to explore. Therefore the relationship with the primary attachment figures may simply be stronger than other attachments, rather than different in quality as Bowlby believed C- this means that Bowlby may have been wrong to suggest that there is a unique quality to a child’s primary attachment P- it is socially sensitive because of implications for mothers lifestyle E- this is because his idea that a child has one attachment that is crucial to development places stress and strain on mother. He argued that any separations from the carefuver during critical; period is likely to negatively effect the quality of attachment. C-therefore this is problematic as it suggests that if anything goes wrong in the child’s ability to form an attachment it is the mother it bklame and following his idea may pressure some women to stay at home and give up work- financial difficulties.

Answer 26

ainsworth and bell developed the strange situation as a method to assess the quality of a babys attachment to a caregiver. its a controlled observation in a lab.

Answer 27

1. proximity seeking 2. exploration and secure base behaviour 3. stranger anxiety 4.seperation anxiety 5. response to reunion with caregivers

Answer 28

seven episodes each lasting 3 mins and assessed attachment behaviours to find type of attachment

Answer 29

- display exploration but will use parent as a safe base to explore from -show moderate separation anxiety -show moderate stranger anxiety - accept comfort from mother on reunion

Answer 30

-shows exploration behaviour but doesnt use parent as a safe base - little seperation anxiety -little stranger anxiety -little need or want for comfort when parent returns

Answer 31

- seek more proximity to caregiver so explores less - display severe separation anxiety -severe stranger anxiety -resist comfort when reunited with caregiver

Answer 32

p- good inter rater reliability e- different observers watching the same babies agree of attachment type. bick et al found 94% agreement. this may because the SS takes place under controlled conditions and becayse behavioural categories such as stranger anxiety are easy to observe c- this is a strengths as we can establish that the findings were consistent therefore we can be confident that the attachment type identified does not have any observer bias and is reliable p- good predictive validity e- attachment type predicts later development for example secure babies have a greater sucess at school wheras insecure resistant have more negative outcomes e.g. bullying and MH problems c- this is a strength because findings can be applied to real life in the long term to help improve childrens experiences in the future and offer help. c- however it could be argued SS actually measures genetic differences in anxiety rather than attachment and this is what predicts later development instead

Answer 33

P- one limitation is that the strange situation may be a culture bound test E- researches found that the experiments did not work in japan as their mothers are rarely ever separated from their children. These children showed much higher seperation anxiety resulting in higher insecure resistant. However the SS fails to take into account this could be down to the fact children are raised different ways in different communities. C- this means it’s difficult to know what the SS is measuring in some cultures. P- a further weakness is that there may be a fourth attachment type not assessed by the SS E- main and Solomon identified a fourth category of attachment- disorganised. A mix of resistant and avoidant behaviours. These have experiences severe neglect or abuse associated with psychological disorders C- thus matters because ainsworths classification is only adequate as a description of normal variations in attachment rather than more extreme cases

Answer 34

The differences in the norms and values that exist between people in different cultural groups

Answer 35

Van ijzendoorn and kroonenberg

Answer 36

The researchers looked at the proportion of secure insecure avoidant and insecure resistant attachments between a range of countries. They also looked at differences within the same countries- variations within a culture. They found 32 studies of attachment where the SS had been used (18 in the USA) these were conducted in 8 countries, yielding results for 2000 children. The data was meta-analysed

Answer 37

Overall the most common attachment type was secure. The country that had the highest was Great Britain (75%). One that had the lowest secure attachments was china (50%). Overall the least common attachment type was insecure resistant and was the most common in Israel (29%) japan (27%) and china (25%). Insecure avaoidant attachment was most common in west Germany (35%)

Answer 38

The study suggests that there were cultural differences in the distribution of attachment types. However the variation within cultures was 1.5 times greater than the variation between cultures e.g. in one area of the USA there were only 46% securely attached whilst 90% in another area.

Answer 39

Simonelli et al Study in Italy on 76 children 50% of children had secure attachment 36% insecure avoidant 14% insecure resistant The reason for lower secure and more avoidant was due to increased childcare at an earlier age.

Answer 40

P- van lizendoorns research used a large sample size E-was a meta analysis and consisted of 32 studies from 8 countries on almost 2000 infants C-findings are more generalisable across larger populations e.g. make sure secure attachments are the most common around the world. C-however the number of studies done in each country is unrepresentative- out of the 32 studies 8 were in the USA and only 5 in non western countries so secure may not be the most common. P- use of indigenous researchers E- indigenous researchers are those from the same cultural background as the participants. Using indigenous researchers aids communication between reaservhers and participants aswel as preventing misunderstanding. C- this means that there is a good chance that researchers and Participants communicate successfully increasing internal validity. We can be more confident that these studies measure true cultural differences in attachment.

Answer 41

P-the test used to measure attachment in these studies (SS) is culturally biased E-using the SS in different cultural context from the one for which it was desigigned may be meaningless. The SS was designed in the US where a lack of affection at reunion represents insecure attachment. However in Germany it would be a sign of independence and would be encouraged. C- this means studies using SS may not be measuring true cultural differences in attachment- different assessment tools should be created depending on culture. P-confounding variables may have impacted the results E- studies conducted in different countries may not be matched for sample characteristics e.g. in different countries may use different ages and social classes. Environmental variables may also differ C- this means that studies assessing attachment types in different counties may lack internal validity telling us little about cultural differences in attachment

Answer 42

monotropic theory- is about the positive effects of attachment and what can influence the attachment bond maternal deprivation- about the negative effects of emotional deprivation

Answer 43

All infants need a close relationship with their mother to grow up ‘normally’ If they don’t get thus ‘warm intimate and continuous relationship’ they will be unable to form the template (IWM) needed for good mental health and may have difficulty forming stable relationships with other people. Seperation is different from deprivation and seperation doesn’t always lead to deprivation and can be avoided if alternate emotional care is offered. There is a critical period

Answer 44

Seperation- child simply not in the physical presence of a primary caregiver Deprivation- chid loses an element of care from the primary caregiver

Answer 45

If a child suffers multiple extended seperation from the mother within the critical period without suitable substitute care they become deprived of their emotional care In this case according to Bowlby psychological damage will occur

Answer 46

Intellectual development- abnormally low IQ supported by goldfarb- lower IQ in children in institutions compared to fostered with a good substituation of emotional care. Emotional development- affection less psychopathy- inability to experience guilt or strong emotions for others and prevents development of normal relationships and linked to criminality.

Answer 47

44 thieves study Aim- to investigate effects of maternal deprivation on people to see whether delinquents have suffered deprivation Sample- 44 delinquent teenagers accused of stealing Procedure- all thieves were interviewed for signs of affectionless psychopathy. Families were also interviewed to establish any prolonged seperation/deprivation from mothers. Results- 14 out of 44 thieves could be described as affectionless psychopath. 12 of these had experienced prolonged seperation from, mothers the first 2 years of life. In contrast only 5 had experienced seperation. Conclusions- Bowlby included that prolonged early seperation/deprivation causes emotional problems like affectionate psychopathy.

Answer 48

P- supporting research from animals to support maternal deprivation E- for example levy seperqted baby rats from their mothers and found that it had permanent effects on social development.also harlows study on monkeys showed later effects because they were seperated with their mother. C- this matters because there is evidence that maternal deprivation leads to negative outcomes at least in animals which bowlbys theory suggests

Answer 49

P- sources of evidence for maternal deprivation are flawed E-for example the 44 thieves study was flawed because it was open to researcher bias, Bowlby himself assessed both deprivation and affectionless psychopathy knowing what he hoped to find. Also SDB may have occurred as the families may have modified their answers to seem like between parents. C- this suggests that bowlbys theory of maternal deprivation may lack internal validity due to problem in evidence. P-we can question the generalisability of the above research to humans as human attachment is very different. And find different results E- for example Lewis looked at a larger sample and found little to no evidence of early prolonged seperation predicting criminality or relationship problems C- therefore this suggests he link between MD and AP/criminality is unclear in humans P-bowlbys idea of the critical period may be over exaggerated E- researcher conducted a case of Czech twin boys isolated from 18 months and severely deprived. Later were looked after by loving adults and recovered normally. C- this goes against bowlbys theory of maternal deprivation that children can’t form an attachment after the CP- social interaction. And good aftercare can help children overcome severe deprivation. Therefore it should be considered sensitive instead of critical

Answer 50

This relates to the effects of living in an institution e.g. an orphanage, where children live for long, continuous periods of time usually little emotional care provided in these places

Answer 51

In 1990s media attention to children in Romanian orphanages. There was a lack of food, toys and social interactions. Many were adopted and taken into enriching, caring environments and progress was monitored by psychologists

Answer 52

Researchers followed a group of 165 Romanian orphans who experienced poor conditions before being adopted in UK The study tested the extent to which good care can make up for poor early experiences in institutions Longitudinal design- physical, cognitive and emotional development assessed at 4,6,11,15 and 22-25 years

Answer 53

Intellectual development- on arrival they showed delayed intellectual development, at age 11 adopted children showed different rates of recovery related to age when adopted- those before 6 months had normal IQ and those after had lower. Differences were still evident at aged 16. Attachment type- children adopted after 6 months showed disinhibited attachment behaviours such as attention seeking, clinging and social behaviour aswel as being friendly and affectionate directed towards familiar and unfamiliar adults. However if adopted before 6 months they rarely showed this

Answer 54

These findings support bowlbys view that there is a critical period in the development of attachments- a failure to form an attachment in the first two years appears to have long lasting effects. But if adopted before 6 months they are ‘protected’ from affects of institutionalisation

Answer 55

Used the SS to assess attachment in 95 Romanian orphans aged 12-31 months who had spend most of their lives in institutional care Compared to a control group of 50 children who never experienced instituational care

Answer 56

19% of the institutionalised grou0 were securely attached compared to 94% of control 44% of the institutionalised grou0 had characteristics of disinhibited attachment compared to 20% in controls.