Attachment- Cultural variations in attachment Flashcards
Define culture
-Refers to the norms and values that exist within any group of people
What are cultural variations?
-Differences in norms and values that exist between people in different groups
Give some traits of collectivist cultures
-Social rules focus on promoting selflessness
-Working as a group
-Doing what is best for society
-Families and communities have a central role
Give some traits of individualistic cultures
-Uniqueness
-Autonomy
-Independence
-Self sufficiency
Who carried out a study to find out more about cultural variations in attachment?
-Van Ijzendorrn and Kroonenberg
When was this study carried out?
-1988
What were the aims of the study?
-To investigate whether they could find evidence that intercultural differences exist
-To investigate whether they could find intra-cultural differences exist
-To look at proportions of secure,insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant attachments across a range of countries
What do inter-cultural differences mean
Differences between countries/cultures
What do intra-culture differences mean
Differences within cultures
What is a meta-analysis?
When a researcher looks at the findings from several different studies and produces a statistic to represent the overall effect
What was the procedure?
-Conducted a meta-analysis of 32 studies of attachment
-Using the strange situation they looked at the proportion of the 3 attachment types in 8 different countries
-18 of these studies were in the US
-A total of 1990 children and their mothers were involved in the studies
What were the findings for Germany?
-Low percentage of securely attached children
-35% were insecure avoidant
-57% were securely attached (in comparison to 65% in the US)
Why may this be (Germany)?
-German culture involves keeping some interpersonal space between adults and children
-Infants do not engage in proximity-seeking behaviour which makes them appear insecurely attached
What were the findings in Israel?
-People in Israel live in kibbutzim (communal living)
-Typically brought up my a non family member although they do see their family daily
-They became very upest
-1/2 were classified as anxious/resistant
-64% appeared to be securely attached
What was the aim of Simonella’s (2014) Italian study?
-To see if the proportions of secure and insecure attachments were still the same as previous results
What was the procedure of Simonellas’s study?
-76 12-month-olds were assessed using the SS
What were the results of Simonella’s study?
-50% were secure
-36% were insecure avoidant
Why was there a lower rate of secure attachments in 2014?
-Mothers of young children had long working hours and used professional childcare
What was the aim of Jin et al study in 2012?
-To compare the proportions of attachment types in Korea
What was the procedure of the Jin et al study in 2012?
-87 infants using SS
What were the results of the Jin et al study in 2012?
-Overall proportion of secure: insecure were similar to other countries
-More resistant than avoidant
-Have similar child-rearing styles to japan
How many studies did germany have?
3
How many studies did UK have?
1
How many studies did Netherlands have?
4
How many studies did Sweedon have?
1
How many studies did Israel have?
2
How many studies did Japan have?
2
How many studies did China have?
1
How many studies did US have?
18
What were the resulst for Germany?
S- 57%
IA-35
IR-8
What were the resulst for UK?
S-75
IA-22
IR-3
What were the resulst for Netherlands?
S-67
IA-26
IE-7
What were the resulst for Sweeden?
S-74
IA-22
IR-4
What were the resulst for Israel?
S-64
IA-7
IR-29
What were the resulst for Japan?
S-58
IA-5
IR-27
What were the resulst for China?
S-50
IA-25
IR-25
What were the resulst for US?
S-65
IA-21
IR-14
What were the overall averages
S-65
IA-21
IR-14
Why are the resulst for china significant?
-Very low amount of secure attachments (lower than avergae)
-Higher than average insecure attachments
What is imposed etic?
-Used to describe the use of a technique designed in one cultural but imposed on another
Give a strenth of this study- reliability
-Based on the strange situation
-Comparisons made are therefore using a standardised procedure
-As long as all the researchers used the SS as it was initially used, they should all have controlled variables
-Different researchers’ findings can be compared
-32 studies were assessed, across 8 different countries, looking at nearly 2000 infants
-A large sample increases the reliability of the findings
-Although confounding variables may have been present
-Different countries may have performed the Strange Situation with a varied methodology
-This means that the findings may lack validity
Give a limitation of this study- representitivness and aims
-Not globally representitive
-Van Ijzendoorn & Kroonenberg recognised that data from less Western-oriented cultures were required to establish a more global perspective attachment classifications
- Africa, South America, and Eastern European socialist countries were not represented
-Although they did include collectivist and individualistic cultures were compared so the aim to investigate inter cultural differences (cultures between countries) was achieved but not intra cultural differences
-For example, not all children in israel would have been brought up in kibbutzs so there may have been higher proportions of secure attachments elsewhere in the country
-Overall it is underepresentitve
Give a limitation of this study- misleading findings
-Overall findings are misleading
- As a disproportionately high number of the studies reviewed were conducted in the USA (18/32), the overall findings would have been distorted by these.
-This means that the apparent consistency between cultures might not genuinely reflect how much attachment types vary between cultures.
Give a limitation of this study- ethnocentric
-Applying Strange Situation procedures and behavioural categories is ethnocentric
-Cross-cultural research using the Strange Situation judges and categorises infant behaviour according to behavioural categories that were developed following observations of middle-class American infants.
- This means that when researchers interpret non-American infant behaviour, it is being judged against an American standard. Eg. an infant exploring the playroom by themselves would be classed as avoidant based on American standards but is valued as reflecting independence in Germany
What did van izendoor and krronenberg conclude?
-Patterns of attachment across cultures (inter-cultural differences) appear to be similar to that of the original data (USA and UK)
-secure attachment is the most common attachment type (the ‘norm’)
What do findings support the concept/ idea of?
-secure attachment is required for healthy social and emotional development
Attachment is an innate process
Summarise the findings.
-There was a wide variation between the attachment types in different studies
-All countries showed securely attached as the most common classification (this varied from 75% in the UK to 50% in China)
-In individualist cultures (such as the UK and the US), insecure-resistant attachment was under 14% of infants assessed (similar to Ainsworth’s original sample)
-Individualistic cultures had high levels of resistant-avoidant attachment
-In collectivist cultures (such as China and Japan), insecure-resistant attachment was above 25% of infants assessed
-Variation in results of intra-cultural studies was 150% greater than in inter-cultural studies where variation was small
