attachment: influence of attachment on later relationships Flashcards
What is the internal working model proposed by Bowlby?
A mental representation of the relationship with the primary caregiver that influences future relationships.
How does a child’s first attachment affect their future relationships?
A loving and secure first attachment leads to successful relationships, while poor treatment leads to expectations of poor treatment in future relationships.
What did Rowan Myron-Wilson and Peter Smith assess in their study?
Attachment type and bullying involvement in 196 children ages 7-11 from London.
they did this using standardised questionnaires
What was the result regarding secure children in the study by Myron-Wilson and Smith?
Secure children were very unlikely to be involved in bullying.
Which attachment type was most likely to be victims of bullying according to Myron-Wilson and Smith?
Insecure-avoidant children.
Which attachment type was most likely to be bullies in the study by Myron-Wilson and Smith?
Insecure-resistant children.
What does the study by Myron-Wilson and Smith suggest about securely attached babies?
They tend to form the best quality childhood friendships.
true or false: insecure-aboidant children were most likely to be victims of bullying
TRUE
What was the focus of the study conducted by Cindy Hazan and Philip Shaver?
The analysis of love experiences and attachment types based on responses to a love quiz.
- 1st section: assessed respondents current or most important relationship
- 2nd section: assessed general love experiences such as number of partners
- 3rd section: assessed attachment type
how many results did Hazan and Shaver analyse
620 replies to the love quiz
What percentage of respondents in Hazan and Shaver’s study were identified as securely attached?
56%
25% insecurely avoidant
19% insecure-resistant
What did the avoidant respondents in Hazan and Shaver’s study tend to reveal?
Jealousy and fear of intimacy.
what did the secure respondents report
they were most likely to have good long-lasting relationships
What does Hazan and Shaver’s study suggest about attachment behavior?
Patterns of attachment behavior are reflected in romantic relationships.
What was the focus of Bailey et al’s study?
The attachment of 99 mothers to their babies and to their own mothers.
How was mother-baby attachment assessed in Bailey et al’s study?
Using the strange situation procedure.
How was mother-mother attachment assessed in Bailey et al’s study?
with an adult-attachment interview
What did Bailey et al find regarding attachment classification?
The majority of women had the same attachment classification to their babies and their own mothers.
What does Bailey et al’s study suggest about the internal working model?
It may affect the child’s ability to parent their own children.
People tend to base their parenting style on their internal working model.
Fill in the blank: A child with a secure attachment will likely form _______ relationships.
[successful]
True or False: Insecure-resistant children are more likely to be victims of bullying.
False.
AO3: validity
One limitation is that early attachment is assessed retrospectively
Most research is not longitudinal. Instead researchers usually ask adolescents or adults questions about their relationships with parents and identify attachment from this.
Asking questions relies on honesty and accurate perception of the participants.
Additionally, it means it is very** hard to know whether what is being assessed is early attachment or in fact adult attachment**
WEAKNESS as the measure of attachment used by most studies may be confounding with other factors making them meaningless.
AO3: no causal relationship
There is an issue with association
The internal working model suggests that an infants attachment type determines the quality of their later relationships.
This is a weakness because there may simply be an association between the two variables and instead another third variable such as parenting style might have a direct effect on both attachment and the child’s ability to form relationships with others.
Therefore we cannot be certain that the internal working model caused these later outcomes
AO3: contradicting evidence
The evidence on continuity is mixed
The internal working model predicts that continuity between the security of an infants attachment and that of its later relationships, i.e. attachment type in infancy is usually the same as that characterising the persons later relationships.
However, there is evidence which does not suggest this. For example Zimmermann assessed infant attachment type and adolescent attachment to parents. There was very little relationship between quality of infant and adolescent attachment.
WEAKNESS because there is contradicting evidence.
