Attachment Flashcards
Maccoby 1980
Identification of attachment Seeking proximity Distressed on separation Happy on reunion General behaviour orientation
What is attachment?
An emotional bond between 2 people.
Konrad Lorenz 1930’s Greylag geese
Eggs in an incubator
Others under biological mother
Present at birth when eggs from incubator hatched
They followed Konrad whilst the others followed biological mother.
Whoevere is present at birth attachment is formed.
Critical period for Konrad
32 hours
What is imprinting?
Rapid attachment
Klaus and kennel 1976
Skin to skin contact= closer bonds.
Control and experimental group.
Control had routine contact
whilst the experimental group had extended contact one extra hour of skin to skin contact after birth and then extra five hours of contact.
The result of the experimental group was that mothers showed more soothing behaviours e.g. Cuddling.
Closer proximity and gazed more than the routine group.
Closer bonds.
Findings led to sensitive period for bonding to take place.
Better for fathers to be present at birth aswell
Supporting study for klaus and kennel
De chateau et al
De chateau et al
Found out that mothers with extended time with their mothers had more affection for child.
Skin to skin contact has positive affect
Schaffer and Emerson
Development of attachments
60 Glasgow babies
Looked at separation anxiety and stranger distress.
Visited baby and interviewed mother on baby’s behaviour based on the two factors
Findings-
Separation anxiety from attachment figure at 6-8 months … Fear of strangers a month later.
First attachment then multiple.
After preferred first attachment made multiple attachments were made..... First attachment with: 65% with mother 27% with mother and father 3% with father.
Learning theory operant conditioning - Dollard and Miller
Feeding.
Skinner.lever.dog.food.repeated.
Positive reinforcement - reward enables the behaviour to be repeated.
Negative reinforcement - when behaviour switches off something unpleasant.
How this is applied to baby?
Cry - mother negative reinforcement
Baby learns- positive reinforcement.
Learning theory classical conditioning.
Unconditioned stimulus - from environment that produces an automatic unlearned response.
Unconditioned response - unlearned reflex response.
Terms of attachment.
US- milk.
UR- baby cries of hunger
Harlow and Zimmerman
8 baby Rhesus monkeys 2 identical surrogate mothers One wired with feed Other with soft padding. Tested attachment with noisy mechanical toy Comfort mother most returned too More to attachment then feeding and rewards Against learning theory and bowlby.
Social learning explanations
By Bandura
Learn behaviour through influence and imitations
Hay and Vespo
social learning explanations
Say that adults act as role models and teach children how catty out certain relationships by presenting it with their own life.
Role modelling.
Direct instruction
Social facilitation
Are looked at when adults are socialising.
DOES NOT EXPLAIN EMOTION
DOES NOT EXPLAIN EMOTION..
John Bowlby 1940s
Two key theories -
Maternal deprivation hypothesis
Theory of attachment
Attachment was an evolved mechanism that ensured survival of child.
Parents instincts to care for child.
Till maturity.
Bowlbys Monotropy-
A special attachment at the top of the hierarchy
Internal working model - Bowlby
First attachment provides child with template for future relationships. Leads on to CONTINUITY HYPOTHESIS.
Sensitive period - Bowlby
6-9 months shouldn’t be disrupted otherwise there would be different consequences.
Black and Schutte 06 - continuity hypothesis
205 young adults
Had to complete tasks to assess childhood and adult attachment types…
- Adult attachment interview
- List of adjectives that described their childhood relations with parents.
- Significant childhood events that represented their relationship with parents.
Findings-
Children who were more loving and shared a positive relation with mothers were more able to open up to their partners, seeking comfort and having trust.
Positive relations with fathers more reliant on partners.
SUPPORTS BOWLBY’S CLAIMS ON CONTINUITY HYPOTHESIS
Main and Goldwyn
Poor child early relations result to poor adult relationships….. Earned security when socialising
AINSWORTH
Strange situation
Used Maccoby identification of attachment
Stranger distress and separation anxiety.
8 steps
- Mother and infant enter room.
- After three minutes stranger enters sit on chair talks with mother.
- Stranger approaches infant attempting to interact.
- Mother leaves room with stranger and baby alone. Stranger comforts baby if upset.
- After 3mins mother returns stranger leaves.
- Mother leaves again after 3 minutes leaving baby all alone.
- Stranger re enters offers comfort and play.
- Mother returns and stranger leaves.
Came up with three types of attachment behaviour…..
Secure infants.Insecure infants.Insecure ambivalent.
Secure infants - AINSWORTH TB
Used mother as a safe base, happy to explore when mother was present.
Distress on separation but joy on reunion. Settles down quickly
70% babies fell into this category.
Insecure-avoidant attachment
TA
Some distress on separation but didn’t seek comfort on return
Rejected strangers attempts at comforting them
Baby’s kept distance
15% babies in this category
Insecure ambivalent attachment TC
very upset at separation but not easily comforted when mother returned
Angry and rejected mothers comforts
Alternated from closeness and wanting distance
15% in this category.
