Attachment

Question 1

What are the two components of caregiver-infant interactions?

Answer 1

• reciprocity

- interactional synchrony

Question 2

Define Reciprocity

Answer 2

An interaction is reciprocal when each person responds to the other and elicits a response from them

Question 3

Define interactional synchrony

Answer 3

• when a mother and infant reflect both the actions and emotions of the other and do this in a co-ordinated (synchronized) way.

Question 4

Evaluate caregiver-infant interactions

Answer 4

• it’s hard to identify infants ‘alert phases’ when observing interactions. We can’t know that any hand movements or expression changes have special meaning
• any observations conducted are extremely controlled and usually filmed from a number of angles, additionally infants aren’t susceptible to demand characteristics

Question 5

Who conducted research into interactional synchrony?

Answer 5

• mertzoff and Moore observed an adult displaying 1 of 3 facial expressions or 1 of 3 distinctive gestures.
• the child’s response was filmed and identified by independent observers and an association was found

Question 6

Who conducted research into parent-infant attachment and what did they find?

Answer 6

• Schaffer and Emerson (1964) found that the majority of infants formed a specific attachment to their mother around the first 7 months
• after a following month they would make secondary attachments. 75% of infants studied showed and attachment to their father by 18 months
• 60 babies all from Glasgow (31 male, 29 female)

Question 7

Explain the Role of the father

Answer 7

A longitudinal study was conducted in which the fathers role in attachment stemmed from play and stimulation as oppose to nurture

Question 8

Explain fathers as primary care givers

Answer 8

• when the primary care-giver fathers have been observed to adopt behaviors more typical of mothers
• in a study primary care-giver fathers would smile, imitate and hold their child significantly more than the secondary care-giver fathers
• not to do with gender, just the roles

Question 9

Evaluate attachment figures

Answer 9

• research into roles of fathers is inconsistent due to the role of primary vs secondary care-giver fathers contradicting each other
• the role of the father may not be significant at all due to children with no fathers developing in the same way
• hormones like oestrogen May play a role in why the mother, if present, is the primary care-giver

Question 10

Evaluate Shaffer and Emerson’s experiment

Answer 10

• good external validity as the research was conducted by the parent at home, minimizing the affect of observers on behavior
• longitudinal design give it high internal validity as there is no confounding variable of individual differences
• limited sample size (60)

Question 11

What are the 4 stages of attachment as identified by Shaffer and Emerson?

Answer 11

• stage 1 (Asocial, first few weeks)
  Infants begin to form bonds, however their behavior towards non-human objects and humans is quite similar
  Familiar adults find it easier to calm them
• stage 2 (indiscriminate attachment, 2-7 months)
  Babies show more observable social behavior and now recognize familiar adults but attachment behavior is no different for any one person
• stage 3 (specific attachment, around 7 months)
  Babies begin to form a primary attachment figure, 65% of which was the mother. With this cones stranger and separation anxiety
• stage 4 (multiple attachment, shortly after)
  Babies begin to form secondary attachments with other family members. By 18 months 75% of those studied had forms a secondary attachment with their father)

Question 12

Evaluate the stages of attachment

Answer 12

• difficulty in measuring the asocial stage as at this point babies are pretty much immobile and don’t show much observable behavior
• van ijzendoorn suggested that multiple attachments were formed from the outset in collectivist cultures (contradicting evidence)
• Bowlby suggested that measuring multiple attachment is difficult due to infants forming playmates. These playmates May cause distress, however this doesn’t signify attachment

Question 13

What research did Lorenz conduct on attachment and what did he find?

Answer 13

• Lorenz began by dividing a clutch of geese eggs in half giving half to the mother and half were to hatch in an incubator with him.
• he identified a critical period in which the birds would imprint on the first moving thing they saw. If imprinting didn’t happen in the critical period they wouldn’t attach to anything
• he found that his group would follow him everywhere and the control group would follow the mother everywhere, even when mixed they would follow their attachment figure
• it was also found that imprinting was sexual too and what ever the geese imprinted on they would be sexually attracted to that species

Question 14

Evaluate Lorenz’s research

Answer 14

• not necessarily generalizable to humans. Mammals and birds differ significantly
• (sexual imprinting may not be permanent) follow up studies found that animals with experience can eventually learn to prefer mating with another species

Question 15

What research did Harlow conduct into attachment?

Answer 15

• worked with rhesus monkeys which are more similar to humans than geese
• (1958) he reared 16 monkeys into bird cages with 2 wire model ‘mothers’ in one condition milk was disowned by the plain wire monkey and in the second condition milk was dispensed by the cloth-covered monkey.
• it was found that baby monkeys would cuddle the soft monkey in preference to the wire one and when frightened would seek comfort from the cloth on regardless of which dispensed milk.
• showed that contact comfort was more important that food when it came to attachment
• critical period was also identified, however it was within 90 days for an attachment to form

Question 16

What did Harlow observe in maternally deprived monkeys?

Answer 16

• it was found that those who didn’t have a ‘real’ mother (all of his monkeys) were significantly more aggressive and less sociable
• they bred less than normal monkeys and even if they did the mother usually killed the infant

Question 17

Evaluate Harlow’s research

Answer 17

• Harlow’s research completely rocked the psychological community as prior to this it was thought attachment was primarily to do with being fed
• practical value of acting on critical periods of humans and animals in real life situations
• severe criticism for how unethical his study was

Question 18

How does the learning theory explain attachment?

Answer 18

• they believe that attachment is learnt through classical conditioning. The UCS of being fed causes the UCR of pleasure, over time the mother (NS) becomes associated with the UCR causing her to be the CS and pleasure to be the CR
• additionally they believe that operant conditioning maintains this attachment, as when a baby cry’s for example the care giver will feed them in response positively reinforcing that behavior.
  (Care giver revived negative reinforcement from This)
• alternately some believe that hunger is our innate primary drive and that when care-givers provide food they are generalized to the primary drive, attachment is thus a secondary drive

Question 19

Evaluate the learning theory of attachment

Answer 19

• counter evidence provided by animal studies. Lorenz showed us that geese can imprint and form attachment before being fed (critical period) and Harlow showed us that monkeys chose comfort over the surrogate mother who provided food (contact comfort) learning theorists believe non-human animals and humans are equivalent so this is a limitation
• Shaffer and Emerson found that primary attachments could be formed around 7months even if they were being fed by multiple care-givers
• completely disregards reciprocity and interactional synchrony as factors of attachment

Question 20

Describe monotropy and the principles used by bowlby

Answer 20

• montropy places great emphasis on a child’s attachment to one particular caregiver, they were called the primary caregiver and the attachment between them was more important than the others

Principles:

• the law of continuity stated that the more constant and predictable a child’s care, the better the quality of their attachment
• the law of accumulated separation stated that the effects of every separation from the primary care giver adds up. The safest dose is therefore a zero dose

Question 21

Describe social releasers and the critical period (bowlbys monotropic theory)

Answer 21

• social releasers refer to the innate set of ‘cute’ behaviors a child has e.g. smiling, cooing and grabbing that encourage attention from adults
• bowlby identified a critical or sensitive period in infants that was around 2 years old (if an attachment is not formed in this time they will struggle to make attachments later on)

Question 22

What is the internal working model (bowlbys monotropic theory)

Answer 22

• this is when a child forms a mental representation of their relationship with their primary care giver. That mental representation then serves as a model for what relationships are like.
• the internal working model affects the child’s later ability to be a parent as they will base their parenting on how they were treated

Question 23

Evaluate bowlbys monotropic theory

Answer 23

• not supported but Shaffer and Emerson who found that 65% of their infants formed a specific attachment, however a significant minority formed multiple attachments at the same time
• supporting evidence for social releasers, an experiment conducted found that when primary attachment figures were told to ignore their babies signals (social releasers) they initially showed some distress but after some time some responded by curling up and lying motionless