Attachment: Types Of Attachment (L1-5)

Question 1

What is developmental psychology?

Answer 1

• a branch of psychology concerned with the progressive behavioural changes that occur in individuals across their lifespan

Question 2

What is attachment?

Answer 2

• an emotional bond between two people
• it is a 2 way process that endures over time

Question 3

Caregiver-Infant Interactions (2)

Answer 3

• reciprocity
• interactional synchrony

Question 4

What is reciprocity?

Answer 4

• referred to as turn taking
• is a two way, mutual process, where each party responds to the others signals to sustain interaction
• behaviour from each elicits a response from the other
• studies have demonstrated that infants coordinate their actions with their caregivers actions in a kind of convo
• the regularity of an infants signals allows a caregiver to anticipate the infants behaviour and respond appropriately
• sensitivity to infant behaviour lays foundation for later attachment between caregiver and infant

Question 5

What is interactional synchrony?

Answer 5

• when adults and babies respond in time to sustain communication
• interact in such a way that their actions and emotions mirror each other
• research found that infants as young as two or three weeks old imitated specific facial and hand gestures that they saw adults do
• adult model displayed one of three facial expressions or hand movements, a dummy was placed in the baby’s mouth during the display to
  prevent any response
• following the display the dummy was removed and the infant’s expression was filmed
• they found that there was an association
  between the infant’s behaviour and the adult model

Question 6

Evaluation of Caregiver and Infant Interactions +ve:

Answer 6

• Murray and Trevarthen (1985) got mothers to interact with their babies over a video monitor
• in next part of the study the babies were played a tape of their mother so she was not responding to them
• babies tried to attract their mother’s attention but when this failed they gave up responding
• shows babies want their mothers to reciprocate
  = Abravanal and DeYong (1991) observed infant behaviour when interacting with a puppet that looked like a human mouth opening and closing
  = Infant’s made little response to this, which shows they are not just imitating what they see
  = interactional synchrony is a specific social response

Question 7

Evaluation of Caregiver and Infant Interactions -ve:

Answer 7

• babies cannot use language to communicate so psychologists are relying on their inferences
• they cannot be sure that infants are actually trying to communicate with their caregiver
  = the expressions tested (tongue sticking out, yawning, and smiling) are ones that infants frequently make so they may not have been deliberately imitating what they saw

Question 8

Difficulties Investigating Caregiver–Infant Interaction (4)

Answer 8

1. studies found that babies’ attachment behaviours are much stronger in lab settings than they are in their home environment
   - so studies should take place in a natural setting (e.g. the child’s home) to increase validity
2. most studies into caregiver-infant interactions are observational so there may be bias in the observer’s interpretation of what they see (observer bias)
   - can be countered by using more than one observer (inter-rater reliability)
3. practical issues when investigating caregiver-infant interactions
   - infants are often asleep or feeding when psychologists want to observe them
   - researchers need to use fewer but shorter observation periods because of babies limited waking periods
4. extra care needs to be taken about ethics when investigating caregiver-infant interactions so as not to affect the child or parent in any way e.g. protection from harm, confidentiality etc

Question 9

How did the Stages of Attachment come about?

Answer 9

• Shaffer and Emerson (1964) investigated the development of attachment in infants
• used a longitudinal study where they followed 60 infants and their mothers for 2 years
• decided that there were 4 stages in the development of attachment in infants

Question 10

What are the 4 stages in the development of attachment in infants?

Answer 10

• Pre-attachment
• Indiscriminate attachment
• Discriminate attachment
• Multiple attachments

Question 11

What is the pre-attachment stage?

Answer 11

• 0-3 months
• from six weeks of age infants become
  attracted to other humans, preferring them to objects and events
• preference is demonstrated by their smiling at people’s faces

Question 12

What is the indiscriminate attachment stage?

Answer 12

• 4-7 months
• infants begin to discriminate between familiar and unfamiliar people, smiling more at people they know
• they will still allow strangers to handle them

Question 13

What is the discriminate attachment stage?

Answer 13

• 7 months onwards
• infants develop a specific attachment to their primary attachment figure (usually the mother)
  staying close to that person
• they show separation protest (the distress
  an infant shows when their primary attachment figure leaves them)
• also display stranger anxiety (the distress an infant shows when approached by someone they do not know)
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964) noticed that
  the infant’s primary attachment figure was not always the person who spends the most time with the child
• concluded that it is the quality of the relationship, not quantity that matters the most in the formation of an attachment

Question 14

What is the multiple attachments stage?

Answer 14

• 7 months onwards
• for most babies their mother is their primary attachment figure
• very soon after developing their first attachment infants develop strong emotional ties with other major caregivers at around 7 months
• such as the father and grandparents, and non-caregivers, such as siblings, these are called secondary attachments
• fear of strangers weakens but their attachment to their primary attachment figure remains the strongest

Question 15

Evaluation of the Stages of Attachment -ve:

Answer 15

• data collected by Shaffer and Emerson (1964) may be unreliable as it was based on mothers’ reports of their infants
• some mothers might have been less sensitive to their infant’s protests and therefore been less likely to report them
  = sample was biased because it only included infants from a working-class population
  = so findings might not apply to other social groups
• sample was also biased because it only included infants from individualist cultures
• infants from collectivist cultures could form attachments in a different way
  = does not have temporal validity, it was conducted in the 1960s and parental care of children has changed considerably since then
  = more women go out to work and more men stay at home
• stage theories such as this one are inflexible and do not take account of individual difference
• some infants might form multiple attachment first, rather than starting with a single attachment

Question 16

?% of infants formed an attachment with their father by the age of ??

Answer 16

• 75%
• 18 months

Question 17

Why are fathers less likely to be their childs’ primary attachment figure?

Answer 17

• might be because they spend less time with their infants
• also possible that most men are not as psychologically equipped to form an intense
  attachment because they lack the emotional sensitivity that women have
• could be due to biological factors as female hormone oxytocin underlies caring behaviour so women are more orientated to interpersonal goals than men
• or it could be due to societal norms. In some cultures there is also the stereotype that it is feminine to be sensitive to the needs of others

Question 18

What role do fathers supposedly fulfil?

Answer 18

• fathers fulfils a qualitatively different role
  from that of the mother
• they provide play and stimulation to complement the role of the mother, which is to provide emotional support
• father’s role is considered just as crucial to the child’s wellbeing

Question 19

Role of the Father -ve Evaluation:

Answer 19

• inconsistency in the research as to the importance of the role of the father
• research investigating the effects of growing up in a single female or same-sex parent family show there is no effect on development
• therefore suggests the role of the father is not important
  = seems the father is less important to later development than the mother in terms of nurture
  = Grossman (2002) found that the early attachment to the mother was a better predictor of what the teenage relationship was like than the early attachment with the father
  = but if the father had engaged in active play with the child when they were young, the adolescent relationship with BOTH parents was strengthened
• research questions whether the father plays a distinct role
• studies show that the father in a single parent family is more likely to adopt the traditional
  maternal role and can be their child’s primary attachment figure
  = Field (1978) conducted research which compared the behaviours of primary caregiver mothers with primary and secondary caregiver fathers
  = face-to-face interactions were analysed from video footage with infants at four months of age
  = overall, observed that fathers engaged more in game playing and held infants less
  = but primary caretaker fathers engaged in significantly more smiling, imitative grimaces and imitative vocalisations than secondary
  caregiver fathers
  = behaviour of primary caregiver fathers was comparable with that of mothers’ behaviour
  = demonstrates that there is flexibility in
  the role of the father and how men can respond to the different needs of their
  children

Question 20

What is The Strange Situation by Ainsworth et al (1970)?

Answer 20

• done to investigate differences in attachments between infants and their caregivers
• controlled observation, took place in a room that had been furnished with some toys
• investigators observed the infants in a series of three-minute episodes;
  1. mother and baby,
  2. stranger enters,
  3. mother leaves,
  4. mother returns, etc.
• recorded an infant’s proximity seeking, stranger anxiety, separation protest and reunion joy

Question 21

Attachment types identified from The Strange Situation?

Answer 21

• Type A, Insecure-Avoidant
• Type B, Secure Attachment
• Type C, Insecure-Resistant

Question 22

A, Insecure-Avoidant and % (TSS)?

Answer 22

• 20%
• largely ignore their caregiver and play
  independently while they explore the room
• no separation protest, show no signs of distress when the caregiver is absent
• no reunion joy, continue to ignore them when they return
• no stranger anxiety, baby is distressed when left completely alone but is comforted by the stranger as easily as their caregiver
• caregiver and the stranger are treated in much the same way

Question 23

B, Secure Attachment and % (TSS)?

Answer 23

• 70%
• play happily while the caregiver is present and use them as a safe base while they explore the room and play with the toys
• separation protest, clearly distressed when the caregiver leaves even if they are not left completely alone
• seeks immediate contact with their
  caregiver when they return, reunion joy
• their caregiver easily comforts them
• baby is wary of the stranger, stranger anxiety
• but accepts some comfort from them when the caregiver is absent

Question 24

C, Insecure-Resistant and % (TSS)?

Answer 24

• 10%
• fussy and cry more than other babies
• will not explore the room or play with the
  toys very much, instead they are clingy
• baby is distressed when the caregiver leaves, extreme separation protest
• but resist comfort from the caregiver on reunion (no reunion joy)
• they strongly resist the stranger’s attempts to make contact, extreme stranger anxiety

Question 25

The Strange Situation +ve Evaluation:

Answer 25

• has been replicated many times over the years
• is easy to replicate this study because it had a high level of control and standardised procedures
• has been carried out successfully in many different cultures

Question 26

The Strange Situation -ve Evaluation:

Answer 26

• methodology was developed in the United States and so may be culturally biased
• attachment behaviour that is seen as healthy in the United States may not be seen as such in all cultures
• in Germany at this time very few mothers
  worked (less than 1 in 5) but children were encouraged to be independent and
  self-reliant
• German parents view some of the behaviour exhibited by securely attached infants, such as crying when their mothers leave the room, as being spoilt so do not reward this behaviour
• this is why these children may have shown less anxiety when separated from their mothers and been classed as avoidant
  = validity of some measures has been questioned
  = could be argued that proximity seeking could be a measure of insecurity rather than security
• gender biased as it has only ever been carried out using mothers as the caregiver
• children might be insecurely attached to their
  mothers but securely attached to their fathers
• strange situation is therefore not measuring a child’s overall attachment style but their attachment to one individual
• Main and Weston (1981) found that children behave differently depending on which parent they are with

Question 27

What did Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988) do?

Answer 27

• conducted a meta analysis of 32 studies into attachment to see if attachment occurs in the same way across all cultures
• all studies included used TSS to measure attachment
• studies looked at the relationships between mother and their babies, all under 24 months of age
• studies conducted in 8 countries
• some with individualistic cultures (USA, UK and Germany)
• some with collectivist cultures (Japan, China and Israel)

Question 28

What were the main findings of Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenbergs’ meta-analysis?

Answer 28

• secure attachments most common in all 8 countries
• second most common style insecure avoidant, except in Israel and Japan, avoidant rare but resistant common
• lowest % of secure in China
• highest % of secure GB
• highest % of insecure avoidant West Germany
• variations within cultures 1.5x greater than variation between cultures

Question 29

What do the similarities and differences between cultures tell us about attachment?

Answer 29

• similarities suggest that caregiver and infant interactions have universal characteristics so may be partly instinctive
• differences between cultures show cultural differences in child rearing practices play important role in attachment style
• variations within cultures indicate sub-cultural differences, like social class, play important role in infants attachment style, these factors possibly more important than culture

Question 30

Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenburg Cultural Variations +ve Evaluation:

Answer 30

• study is a meta-analysis, which includes a very large sample
• increases the validity of the findings

Question 31

Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenburg Cultural Variations -ve Evaluation:

Answer 31

• methodology developed in US
• may not be valid in other cultures
• e.g Ainsworth assumed that a willingness to explore means a child is securely attached but this may not be the case in other cultures
• means the methodology is culturally biased
  = infants from Israel in this study lived on a Kibbutz (closed community) and did not come into contact with strangers
  = could be the reason why these children showed severe distress when confronted with strangers and so classed as insecure-resistant
• study was not actually comparing cultures but countries
• e.g they compared the USA with Japan, both countries have many different sub-cultures that have different child rearing practices
• study of attachment in Tokyo found similar attachment style distributions to the USA, whereas studies in more rural areas of Japan found many more insecure-resistant infants
  = all studies used in meta-analysis looked at infants’ attachments to mothers
  = children might be insecurely attached to their mothers but securely attached to their fathers
  = TSS is not measuring a child’s attachment style but their attachment to one individual
  = Main and Weston (1981) found that children behave differently depending on which parent they are with