Attachment: Stages Of Attachment Flashcards
Schaffer And Emerson Study.
Aim: Investigate formation of early attachments in particular the age at which they develop emotional intensity and to whom the emotions were directed to.
Procedure: 60 babies were involved, all from Glasgow and majority from skilled WC families. Babies and mother were visited every month for the first year and then again at 18 months. Asked mother questions on what kind of protests their baby showed during some everyday separations (used to measure infants attachment). As well as assess stranger anxiety (distress an infant shows when an unfamiliar individual approaches).
Findings: At 25-32 weeks of age 50% showed signs of separation anxiety towards a particular adult (specific attachment). Attachment tended to be the caregiver who were more sensitive to infant signals.
Conclusion: Schaffer and Emmerson proposed that attachment developed in four stages.
Attachment Stage 1: Asocial
Developed 0-8 weeks.
- Recognise specific face.
- Happier in presence of humans than when alone.
- Behaviour between humans and non-human objects quite similar.
- Smile at anyone.
- Preference for familiar individual.
- Preference faces to non-faces.
Attachment Stage 2: Indiscriminate Attachment
- Developed at 2-7 months.
- Recognise and prefer familiar people.
- Smile more at familiar than unfamiliar faces.
- Preference for people rather than inanimate objects.
- Accept comfort from any adult.
Attachment Stage 3: Specific Attachments
- Developed at 7-12 months.
- Primary attachment to one particular individual, someone who shows most sensitivity.
- Shows stranger anxiety.
- Shows separation anxiety.
- Use familiar adults as secure base.
Attachment Stage 4: Multiple Attachments
- Developed at 1 year onwards.
- Form secondary attachment with familiar adults with, whom they spend time with.
Strength: Evaluation - External Validity.
- The study has good external validity.
- It was carried out in the families’ own home and most of the observation was done by the parents during ordinary activities and reported back to the researchers.
- This means that the behaviour of the babies was unlikely to be affected by the presence if observers and is therefore natural.
Strength: Evaluation - Longitudinal Design
- This study was a longitudinal study.
- The same children were followed up over the 18 months study.
- There was no individual differences regarding attachment behaviour in longitudinal which would have been the case if a cross-sectional design was used.
- This increases the internal validity as participant variables does not become a confounding variable.
Weakness: Evaluation - Sample Characteristics
- The sample of the study was 60 babies and their carers. This is a large sample size. Especially considering the large amount of data gathered on each participants.
- Despite the large sample, all of the babies studied were from the same district and social class in the same city.
- Children-reading practices vary from one culture to another.
- The results collected may therefore not generalising well to other social contexts as behaviour may not be representative of different types of individuals from other SC and locations.
Weakness: Evaluation - Studying The Asocial Stage
- There are problems studying asocial behaviour of attachment.
- Babies below 2 months have poor co-ordination and generally immobile.
- This makes it difficult to make any judgements about them based on observation of their behaviour.
Weakness: Conflicting Evidence On Multiple Attachments
- There is mixed evidence on when infants develop multiple attachments.
- Bowlby suggested that infants form attachments to a single main carer before they are capable if developing multiple attachments.
- However, researcher who have studied attachment in different cultural context where it is normal to have multiple caregivers argue multiple attachment occurs from the outset.
- The conflicting research suggests that we do not fully understand how attachments develops.
Weakness: Measuring Attachment
- There may be a problem with how attachment are assessed.
- Researchers tend to assume that distress when an adult leaves a room is a sign that the child is attached to them.
- Bowlby pointed out that infants get distressed when a playmate leaves the room but that this does not signify attachment.
- This suggests that we are not able to distinguish between behaviour shown people that we think an infant should be attached to (caregiver) and those that they are unlikely to be attached to (playmate).
- This is problematic when investigating the stages of attachment.
Weakness: Evaluation - Limited Behavioural Measures
- The behaviours used to measure attachment are crude.
- Schaffer and Emmerson used stranger anxiety and separation anxiety to distinguish the stage of attachment an infant was in.
- Attachment will involve much more complex emotions and behaviours than the two typically used.
- However, the use of such simple behavioural measures allows researchers to scientifically study attachment development.
