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Psychology AQA A-Level Year 1 & AS > Attachment > Flashcards

Attachment Flashcards

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1
Q

What is developmental psychology?

A

The progressive behavioural changes that occur in individuals across their lifespan

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2
Q

What is attachment?

A

Close emotional bond between two people

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3
Q

How many stages of attachment are there?

A

4

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4
Q

What are the stages of attachment?

A

1) pre-attachment (0-3 months)
2) indiscriminate attachment (3-7 months)
3) discriminate attachment (7+ months)
4) multiple attachment (7+ months)

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5
Q

What is pre-attachment (0-3 months)?

A

1) infant becomes attracted to other people
2) prefer people to objects
3) no preferences about carer

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6
Q

What is indiscriminate attachment (3-7 months)?

A

1) infants discriminate between familiar + unfamiliar faces)
2) smile more at people they know
3) no preferences about carer

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7
Q

What is discriminate attachment (7+ months)?

A

1) develop specific attachment to primary attachment figure
2) separation protest shown when primary attachment figure leaves
3) show joy when reunited with primary attachment figure - easily comforted by them
4) displays stranger anxiety
5) primary attachment figure is not always person who spends most time with child - quality of relationship>quantity

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8
Q

What is multiple attachment (7+ months)?

A

1) develop secondary attachments to other major caregivers (grandparents) + non-caregivers (siblings)
2) show seperation protest when when person with secondary attachment leaves
3) stranger anxiety weakens

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9
Q

What is a weakness about Schaffer’s stages of attachment?

A

1) data may be unreliable - based on mothers’ reports of their infants, some mother may have been less sensitive to infant protest + not have reported them
2) biased - infants from working-class population
3) biased - infants from individualist cultures
4) conducted in 1960s - parental care has changed considerably
5) inflexible - some infants form multiple attachments before a single attachment

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10
Q

Why are fathers less likely to be the primary attachment figure than mothers?

A

1) spend less time with infant
2) not as psychologically equipped to form intense attachment - lack emotional sensitivity
3) women more oriented to interpersonal goals
4) stereotype that it is feminine to be sensitive to the needs of others

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11
Q

What is a secure attachment?

A

1) strong bond between infant + caregiver
2) separation protest - distressed when caregiver leaves
3) reunion joy - easily comforted when caregiver returns
4) stranger anxiety

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12
Q

What is an insecure attachment?

A

1) weaker bond between infant + caregiver

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13
Q

What are the types of insecure attachments?

A

1) insecure-avoidant

2) insecure-resistant

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14
Q

What is an insecure-avoidant attachment?

A

1) largely ignore caregiver
2) no separation protest - no distress when caregiver leaves
3) no reunion joy - ignore caregiver on return
4) no stranger anxiety - comforted by stranger as easily as caregiver

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15
Q

What is an insecure-resistant attachment?

A

1) fussy + cry more
2) extreme separation protest - distressed + will not explore/play with toys
3) no reunion joy - resist comfort from caregiver
4) extreme stranger anxiety - resist comfort from stranger

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16
Q

What percentage of infants display a secure attachment?

A

70%

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17
Q

What percentage of infants display an insecure-avoidant attachment?

A

20%

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18
Q

What percentage of infants display an insecure-resistant attachment?

A

10%

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19
Q

What is a strength about the strange situation?

A

1) replicated many times - high level of control + standardised procedures

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20
Q

What is a weakness about the strange situation?

A

1) proposition of ‘insecure-disorganised attachment’ - small number of infants did not fit into any of the 3 categories
2) validity - proximity seeking or just insecurity?
3) lacks ecological validity - may not reflect real world behaviour (much stronger in laboratory than at home)
4) measures attachment to one individual, not attachment style
5) culturally biased - carried out in USA (healthy attachment could be unhealthy in a different country)

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21
Q

What did Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988) do?

A

Carried out a meta-analysis of 32 studies of ‘the strange situation’ in different countries to find overall patterns

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22
Q

What were the results of Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988)?

A

1) secure attachment most common in all countries
2) insecure-avoidant most dominant in western cultures (especially Germany)
3) insecure-resistant most dominant in non-western cultures (especially Japan)

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23
Q

Evaluate the cross-cultural studies of Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988).

A

1) children brought up in different ways depending on the culture - results in different attachment styles
2) different type of study may reveal different patterns of attachment across cultures
3) assumes countries are the same as cultures - they are not
4) meta-analyses can hide individual results that show an unusual trend

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24
Q

What are the overall findings of strange situation research?

A

1) cultural differences found - more avoidant infants found in Germany because Germans value independence
2) causes of attachment types are debatable
3) doesn’t show characteristics of child - only relationship of child with care
4) attachment type may influence later behaviours

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25
Q

How can attachment be disrupted?

A

1) separation

2) deprivation

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26
Q

What is separation?

A

When a child is away from a caregiver they’re attached to

1) relatively short time (hours/days)

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27
Q

What is deprivation?

A

The loss of the mother/attachment figure

1) long-term/permanent

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28
Q

What is the hypothesis of Bowlby’s maternal deprivation theory (1953)?

A

1) deprivation during critical period leads to harmful effect on emotional/social/intellectual/physical development
2) long-term effects of deprivation leads to separation anxiety/problem behaviour
3) effect on future relationships

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29
Q

How do people learn behaviour?

A

1) classical conditioning

2) operant conditioning

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30
Q

What is classical conditioning with regard to an infant?

A

1) unconditioned stimulus of food produces reflex unconditioned response of pleasure
2) neutral stimulus = person providing food
3) neutral stimulus gets associated with unconditioned response (pleasure from food)
4) neutral stimulus becomes conditioned stimulus that produces conditioned response

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31
Q

What does classical conditioning imply?

A

1) how attachment bond develops between infant + carer

2) reason children feel pleasure in caregiver’s presence

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32
Q

What was the method for Bowlby (1944) where he investigated 44 juvenile thieves?

A

1) conducted case studies on 44 adolescents who had been referred to the clinic after stealing
2) control group of 44 emotionally disturbed adolescents who didn’t steal

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33
Q

What were the findings for Bowlby (1944) where he investigated 44 juvenile thieves?

A

1) 17 thieves experienced frequent separations from mothers before 2 years old - compared with 2 in control group
2) 14 thieves diagnosed as affectionless psychopaths
3) 12/14 affectionless psychopaths experienced separation from mothers

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34
Q

What is a strength of the maternal deprivation hypothesis?

A

1) supporting evidence
2) emotionally + maternally deprived orphanage children were less intellectually + socially developed
3) before the theory, hospitals wouldn’t allow parents to visit children in hospital - damaging effect on child + nowadays parents encouraged to stay with children
4) children raised in poor quality orphanage in South America displayed anaclitic depression - staff were overworked/under trained/rarely gave children attention + affection

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35
Q

What is a weakness of the maternal deprivation hypothesis?

A

1) evidence can be criticised
2) thieves’ behaviour could have been a course of other factors such as poverty, not maternal deprivation
3) orphanage children could have been harmed by social deprivation, not maternal deprivation
4) effects are reversible - children who hadn’t formed an attachment by 4, and were then adopted, still formed attachments with adoptive parents
5) deprivation (attachment figure lost) or privation (attachment never formed)?

36
Q

Give an example to show how deprivation can be reversed.

A

Children who had been socially deprived in an orphanage up to the age of 2 quickly improved IQ scores when transferred to a school with one-to-one care

37
Q

How did Lorenz (1935) study imprinting on Geese?

A

1) found that geese imprint - automatically attach to first moving thing they see after hatching, + follow it everywhere
2) randomly divided goose egg into 2 groups - left 1 group with mother, incubated other group
3) goslings from incubator imprinted on Lorenz + showed no recognition of real mother
4) goslings followed Lorenz around in the same way as the goslings from the other group followed their mother
5) put both groups together + two groups reformed + searched for respective mother

38
Q

What were the findings of Lorenz (1935)?

A

1) imprinting was most likely between 13-16 hours after hatching
2) imprinting is fast + automatic - occurs during critical period
3) after critical period it is too late for goslings to imprint
4) imprinting is irreversible + long-lasting - Martina slept on Lorenz’s bed every night
5) early imprinting affected mate preferences (sexual imprinting) - choose to mate with same kind of object they were imprinted onto

39
Q

How did Harlow show that comfort is important in attachment?

A

1) raised rhesus monkeys in isolation for 165 days
2) gave monkeys two ‘mothers’ - wire mesh + cloth
3) 4 monkeys received milk from wire mother/4 monkeys received milk from cloth mother

40
Q

What were the findings of Harlow (1959)?

A

1) monkeys spent most time clinging to cloth mother - gave comfort in new situations (regardless of whether she was the one with the feeding bottle)
2) monkeys only used wire mother to feed + returned to cloth mother

41
Q

What are the strengths about Harlow (1959)?

A

1) laboratory experiment
2) strict control of variables
3) unlikely results affected by unknown variable
4) can be replicated - but ethical guidelines do not permit this

42
Q

What are the weaknesses about Harlow (1959)?

A

1) can’t generalise results to humans - monkeys + humans qualitatively different and humans influenced by culture/society/peers/upbringing
2) ethics - monkeys removed from mothers (traumatic)
3) ethics - monkeys put in stressful situation (deliberately scared) + showed signs of psychological damage
4) ethics - monkeys are social animals - unfair to keep them in isolation
5) lacks ecological validity - monkeys weren’t in natural environment so results can’t be applied to real life

43
Q

What did Harlow (1959) add to his study into the attachment of rhesus monkeys?

A

A fearful object such as an oversized toy

44
Q

What were the findings when Harlow (1959) added a fearful object to the cage?

A

1) monkey would cling to cloth surrogate first before exploring object
2) monkeys with only wire surrogate remained frozen/ran wildly around cafe
3) strong attachment with primary caregiver is highly important in development of infant

45
Q

What are the explanations of attachment?

A

1) learning theory of attachment
2) monotropic theory of attachment
3)

46
Q

What is a strength of the learning theory of attachment?

A

1) lots of support from scientific research

47
Q

What is a weakness of the learning theory of attachment?

A

1) reductionist - tries to explain complex attachment using simple processes
2) lots of animal research - findings aren’t always generalisable

48
Q

What is Bowlby’s monotropic theory of attachment?

A

1) we have evolved an innate drive to attach to primary caregiver - natural selection to ensure survival of child
2) we form one main attachment (usually biological mother) - survival value as a safe base with food + protection
3) internal working model - infant attachment creates mental template for all future relationships
4) continuity hypothesis - primary caregiver provides foundation for all future relationships
5) critical period of 3 years for attachment to develop or it never will
6) lack/breakage of attachment = damage of infant’s social + emotional development

49
Q

What is a strength of Bowlby’s monotropic theory of attachment?

A

1) evidence - Harlow (damage to social + emotional development)

50
Q

What is a weakness of Bowlby’s monotropic theory of attachment?

A

1) many children form multiple attachments + may not attach to their mother
2) Harlow’s study of rhesus monkeys goes against monotropy
3) effects are reversible - children who hadn’t formed an attachment by 4, and were then adopted, still formed attachments with adoptive parents - goes against idea of critical period of 2 years
4) idea of monotropy places burden of responsibility on mothers - they must take the blame for anything wrong + pressurises them to stay home and give up jobs

51
Q

What are social releasers?

A

Behaviours displayed by babies to encourage caregivers to look after them such as smiling + crying

52
Q

What does the continuity hypothesis propose?

A

1) strongly attached infants become socially + emotionally competent
2) not strongly attached infants have more social + emotional difficulties in childhood + adulthood

53
Q

What is the learning theory of attachment?

A

All behaviour is learned rather than being innate/inherited from parents

54
Q

What is a strength of the learning theory of attachment?

A

1) plausible + scientific - provision of needs + person providing needs leads to strong attachments

55
Q

What is a weakness of the learning theory of attachment?

A

1) Harlow (rhesus monkeys) - suggests comfort is more important than food in determining whom a baby will attach to
2) babies often attached to those who play with them rather than who feed them - in 39% of cases, mother fed baby but baby was more attached to someone else
3) explains how attachments form but not why they form - infants form attachments to caregivers to ensure protection
4) environmentally reductionist - explains complex human behaviour in simplistic way (many types of attachment)
5) environmentally deterministic - states early learning determines later attachment behaviour

56
Q

What is institutionalisation?

A

When a child’s living arrangements are outside of the family - children’s homes/hostels/hospitals

57
Q

What is privation?

A

When a child has never had an attachment to its mother//caregiver

58
Q

What is deprivation?

A

When an attachment that was once formed is now broken

59
Q

What did Rutter and Songua-Barke (2010) investigate?

A

1) 165 Romanian children who spent their early lives in institutions + suffered from effects of institutionalisation
2) tested at intervals (4/6/11/15 years) to assess physical/cognitive/social development
3) progress compared to control group of 52 British children adopted before 6 months

60
Q

What were the findings of Rutter and Songua-Barke (2010)?

A

1) Romanian orphans younger than 6 months had same level of emotional development as UK children adopted at same age - caught up
2) Romanian orphans older than 6 months showed signs of insecure attachment + social problems
3) UK chldren older than 6 months didn’t show same problems

61
Q

What were the conclusions of Rutter and Songua-Barke (2010)?

A

1) consequences of institutionalisation can be reversed if children are able to form attachment before 6 months + receive sensitive parenting
2) if children from institutions do not form attachment by 6 months, negative impact on physical + cognitive + social development can be severe and permanent

62
Q

What is a strength of Rutter and Songua-Barke (2010)?

A

1) research has led to changes in the way children are adopted - in the past, mothers were encouraged to nurse children before giving them up for adoption and now, they are adopted in the first week of birth so no attachments are formed + broken

63
Q

What is a weakness of Rutter and Songua-Barke (2010)?

A

1) individual differences affect how strongly child is affected by institutionalisation - 60 children under 4 with tuberculosis had a prolonged hospital stay where they did not receive emotional care from nurses + parents were only allowed to visit once a week. 63% of children were maladjusted in adolescence + 37% suffered no ill effects
2) Romanian children faced with more than emotional deprivation - appalling physical conditions + lack of cognitive stimulation. suggests long-term damage occurs with multiple risk factors, not just lack of attachment
3) physical effects of institutionalisation not permanent - 36 Romanian orphans adopted by Canadian families were physically smaller than control group aged 4 but the difference disappeared by age 10 (same for psychological health)

64
Q

What are the effects of institutionalisation?

A

1) delayed intellectual development
2) disinhibited attachment
3) emotional development
4) lack of internal working model
5) Quasi-Autism
6) physical development

65
Q

How is delayed intellectual development an effect of institutionalisation?

A

1) lower IQ + concentration problems

2) may struggle at school - cannot learn new behaviours + concepts as quickly

66
Q

How is delayed disinhibited attachment an effect of institutionalisation?

A

May not know what is appropriate behaviour towards strangers - overly affectionate + attention-seeking

67
Q

How is delayed emotional development an effect of institutionalisation?

A

Can have difficulty managing anger - have more temper tantrums than other children

68
Q

How is delayed the lack of an internal working model an effect of institutionalisation?

A

May have difficulty interacting with peers + forming close relationships - struggle to parent own children as adults

69
Q

How is Quasi-Autism an effect of institutionalisation?

A

Struggle to understand meaning of social contexts + have obsessional behaviours

70
Q

How is physical development an effect of institutionalisation?

A

Usually physically small - lack of emotional care rather than poor nourishment leads to deprivation dwarfism

71
Q

What is reciprocity?

A

1) turn-taking - interaction flows both ways
2) infants coordinate actions with caregiver’s in a kind of conversation
3) regularity of infant’s signals allows caregiver to anticipate behaviour + respond appropriately

72
Q

What is interactional synchrony?

A

1) adults + babies respond in time to sustain communication

2) caregiver + infant interact in such a way that their actions + emotions mirror each other

73
Q

What did Meltzoff and Moore (1977) investigate?

A

1) adult model displayed 1 of 3 facial expression/hand movements
2) dummy removed form baby + expression filmed
3) there was an association between infant’s behaviour + adult model

74
Q

What is a strength of caregiver + infant interactions?

A

1) First mothers interacted with babies over video monitor, then babies watched tape of mother so she was not responding to them. babies tried to attract mother’s attention but gave up after failing - shows that babies are mirroring mothers to interact with them
2) infants made little response to object that looked like human mouth opening + closing - not just imitating what they see but interactional synchrony is a social response

75
Q

What is a weakness of caregiver + infant interactions?

A

1) expressions tested are ones infants make frequently and so they may not have been deliberately imitating what they saw
2) practically difficult to conduct research using new-born infants - either asleep/feeding

76
Q

What were the long-term effects of Harlow (1959)?

A

1) monkeys fled/froze when approached by other monkeys
2) monkeys did not show normal mating behaviour
3) monkeys did not cradle their own babies
4) monkeys would recover if they spent time with other monkeys (before 3 months old)
5) monkeys could not recover more than 6 months with the wire mother

77
Q

What is a strength of Lorenz (1935)?

A

1) animals born with instinct to attach to first moving object they see - chickens exposed to yellow rubber gloves became imprinted onto them

78
Q

What is a weakness of Lorenz (1935)?

A

1) imprinting is reversible - after imprinting on yellow rubber gloves, if the chickens spent time with their own species, the were able to engage in normal sexual behaviour with other chickens
2) unethical - goslings separated from mother + did not learn normal behaviour (mating)

79
Q

What is the Minnesota Parent-Child Project?

A

1) mothers’ + childrens’ behaviour assessed using questionnaires + observations since 1975
2) videotaped playing for 10-15 minutes at home + then analysed by 2 observers

80
Q

What are the findings of the Minnesota Parent-Child Project?

A

Those who were classified as securely attached were:

1) rated highest for social competency
2) less socially isolated
3) more popular with peers
4) more empathetic

81
Q

What does an early attachment do?

A

1) creates internal working model of relationships
2) how partners in a relationship behave towards each other
3) what to expect of a relationship
4) securely attached infants = positive internal working model - better at forming + maintaining relationships

82
Q

What happens if there is no early attachment?

A

1) lack of internal working model
2) attachment disorder with no preferred attachment figure
3) inability to interact + relate to others (evident from age 5) - usually caused by neglect/frequent change of caregivers

83
Q

What did Hazan and Shaver (1987) do?

A

1) designed study to test relationship between a person’s infant attachment style + internal working model = adult attachment style
2) placed ‘Love Quiz’ in newspaper asking questions about relationship with parents (infant attachment)/current relationship experiences (adult attachment)/attitudes towards love (internal working model)
3) 620 responses - 205 men + 415 women

84
Q

What were the findings of Hazan and Shaver (1987)?

A

1) adult attachment style similar to infant attachment style
2) 56% = secure
3) 25% = insecure-avoidant
4) 19% = insecure-resistant
5) positive correlation between adult attachment style + love experiences
6) secure attachment relationships were most enduring - 10 years average (secure)/6 years (avoidant)/5 years (resistant)
7) relationship between attitudes to love + attachment style - securely attached individuals have positive internal working model

85
Q

What is a weakness of Hazan and Shaver (1987)?

A

1) unreliable - other studies have failed to find a strong correlation between infant attachment style + adult relationships
2) correlational rather than experimental - cannot determine cause + effect (could be a third variable)
3) relies on participants’ memories about early lives - memories are not always accurate making the study potentially invalid

Psychology AQA A-Level Year 1 & AS (7 decks)

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