Attatchment Flashcards
What is RECIPROCITY?
How two people interact e.g a mother and infant respond to each others signals and elicit a response.
Experiment for reciprocity?
Feldman and Eidelman mothers pick up and respond to infant alertness 2/3 of the times.
What is INTERACTIONAL SYNCHRONY?
When an infant mirrors the actions of another person.
Experiment for interactional synchrony?
Meltzoff and Moore made an adult display 3 facial expressions and they found an association between both.
Evaluation for reciprocity and interactional synchrony experiments.
:) controlled observations - no risk of demand characteristics and can be easily replicated.
:( hard to observe babies - they have low motor control and we can’t establish cause and effect.
Fathers as primary care givers
- adopt behaviours more typical of mothers
- spend more time smiling, imitating and holding infants than secondary care givers
Evaluation of attachment figures
:( inconsistent findings of fathers if fathers had distinct role why aren’t children without fathers different.
Schaffer and Emerson experiment
Aim - investigate at what age infant becomes attached, who they become attached to, and if they can form multiple attachments.
Procedure - longitudinal study, 60 infants (working class - Glasgow) families visited once a month over 18 month period to observe interactions and interview caregiver about infant behaviour.
Results - first attachment formed between 6-8 months
- mother was main attachment figure for 65% at 18 months, 3% had primary attachment to father
- 31% formed multiple attachments
Evaluation of Schaffer and Emerson
:) good external validity - observations were done in the home by parents.
:) longitudinal - dame children followed up and observed meaning good internal validity.
:( can’t generalise findings as all families came from same social class.
Stages of attachment
- Asocial stage - 0-6 weeks - all stimuli produces a reaction.
- Indiscriminate attachment - 6 weeks-7 months - enjoy all human company and smile more at familiar faces.
- Specific attachment - 7 months - expresses protest when separated from one individual. Stranger anxiety.
- Multiple attachments - 10 months+ - begin to attach to others
Evaluation of stages of attachment
:( methodological problems - just because baby gets distressed when one person leaves the room doesn’t mean they are an attachment figure.
:( suggests development is inflexible - suggests babies form single attachments before multiple but with most babies it’s the opposite.
What is imprinting?
A form of attachment where offspring follows the first large moving object they see.
Experiment for imprinting
Lorenz
Procedure - set up two conditions
- He was the first moving object to be sen after geese hatched
- Mother goose was the first to be seen
Findings - chicks who saw him first followed him as if he were a mother and tried to mate with him when they got older, ignoring other geese.
- chicks who saw the mother first tried to mate with other geese when they were older.
- there was a ‘critical period’ of a few hours in which to imprint.
Evaluation of Lorenz’s experiment
:) field experiment - high ecological validity
:) high internal and external validity - findings apply to all geese and it accomplished Lorenz’s aims of how imprinting increased the chance of survival of geese.
:( can’t generalise findings to humans
Harlow’s monkey study
Procedure
- reared 16 baby monkeys with two wire mothers
- one wire mother dispensed milk
- one wire mother was covered in cloth and dispensed milk
Findings
- baby monkeys preferred cloth mother
- sought comfort from cloth covered mother when they were scared
- showed contact comfort was more important than food in forming attachments
- those who were maternally deprived were antisocial, aggressive and bred less often. Also neglected young.
Harlow’s monkey evaluation
:) practical applications - helped social workers understand risk of neglect
:) theoretical value - important for psychologists in understanding mammal attachments
:( can’t generalise results to humans
What is the learning theory of attachment?
Assumes that children learn to form an attachment with their caregiver because they give them food.
Classical conditioning
Learning by association
- Food (UCS) = Happy baby (UCR)
- Primary caregiver (NS) + Food (UCS) = Happy baby (UCR)
- Primary caregiver (CS) = Happy baby (CR)
Operant conditioning
Learning through reinforcement
- caregiver may reward baby by feeding them, so they associate caregiver with the reward and repeat action that brings the caregiver close.
Attachment as a secondary drive
- Hunger thought if as primary drive as it is an innate biological motivator
- Caregivers that provide the primary drive become generalised to it
- Attachment is therefore a secondary drive
Evaluation of learning theory of attachment
:( not supported by research
:( ignores other factors associated with forming attachments
Bowlby’s theory of attachment
- attachment evolved as an innate system that gives a survival advantage
- ensures young animals stay close to caregiver to protect them from danger
What is monotropy?
- attachment to one caregiver
- attachment to this one caregiver is more important than other attachments
What is Bowlby’s law of continuity?
The more constant and predictable the care the better quality of attachment
What is Bowlby’s law of accumulated separation?
Effects of separation add up
What are social releasers?
Innate cute behaviours babies are born with to encourage attention.
What is the internal working model?
Child forms mental representation of relationship with primary caregiver and serves as a model for future relationships
Evaluation of monotropy
:( not supported by research
:( unclear - doesn’t explain if there is something more important about the first relationship babies form
:( socially sensitive - accumulated separation places pressure on primary attachment figures to be with their baby all the time
Evaluation of social releasers
:) supported by research - when primary attachment figures ignore babies signals the babies will just lie motionless instead of trying to elicit a response.
Evaluation of internal working model
:) supported by research - 99 mothers were observed and interviewed, those who had poor attachment to their mothers were more likely to be observed as having poor attachment with their child
What is Ainsworth’s strange situation?
- Child encouraged to explore
- Stranger comes in and tries to play with baby
- Caregiver leaves child with stranger
- Caregiver returns and stranger leaves
- Caregiver leaves child alone
- Stranger returns
- Caregiver returns
Strange situation findings
Insecure resistant attachment - explore less as they have high separation/ stranger anxiety
Secure attachment - explore happily but regularly go back to parents, moderate separation/ stranger anxiety
Insecure avoidant attachment - explore freely but don’t show distress when caregiver leaves, little stranger anxiety
Evaluation of strange situation
:) good inter-rator reliability
:( culture bound test - can’t be generalised to other cultures
:( there may be more than 3 types of attachment
:( can’t say that attachment is the main cause of anxiety
What do findings on cultural variations of the strange situation show?
- secure attachment is the norm in a wide range of cultures
- shows cultural practices have an effect on the attachment type
Bowlby’s theory of ‘critical period’
First 30 months are critical for psychological development
Bowlby’s theory of maternal deprivation
Believed that psychological damage was inevitable if the absence of a mother was for an extended period. This would effect intellectual and emotional development.
Experiment for maternal deprivation
Case study of 44 thieves were controlled to a control group of 44 emotionally disturbed adolescents who didn’t steal
44 thieves findings
- 17/44 thieves experienced frequent separations from their mothers compared with 2 in the control group
- 14/44 thieves were seen as affectionless psychopaths, 12 of which experienced separation from mothers
Evaluation of maternal deprivation
:( biased - Bowlby was the one conducting experiment wanting to find his results
:( counter evidence- case study done on large scale showed maternal deprivation didn’t predict criminality/ emotional development
What’s the love quiz?
The love quiz was to see how the internal working model effected future romantic relationships
Love quiz findings
- 56% securely attached - more likely to have good longer lasting relationships
- 25% were insecure avoidants - jealous and fear intimacy
- 19% were insecure
Evaluation for love quiz
:( lacking validity - self report techniques aren’t always honest
:( association doesn’t mean causation
:( mixed research support for internal working model
