Chapter 10 Part 2 Flashcards
Temperament:
Emotional reactivity and self regulation
individual differences in behavioral styles, emotions, and characteristic ways of responding.
• How quickly emotion is shown, how strong it is, how long it lasts, and how soon it fades away.
Temperament is also described in terms of emotional reactivity and self-regulation.
•Reactivity involves variations in the speed and intensity of responding with positive or negative emotions.
• Self-regulation involves variations in the extent or effectiveness of emotional control.
It’s emotional personality basically
What are the three basic types or clusters that psychiatrists Chess and Thomas identified?
Easy child: generally positive mood; quickly establishes regular routines; adapts easily to new experiences.
Difficult child: reacts negatively and cries frequently; irregular daily routines; slow to accept change.
Slow-to-warm-up child: low activity level; somewhat negative; low intensity of mood.
-Chess and Thomas found 40% of children are easy, 10% are difficult, and 15% are slow-to-warm-up.
-Note 35% did not fit any of these patterns
Kagan looked at differences between a shy, subdued, timid child and a sociable, extraverted, bold child.
What’s inhibition to the familiar?
What age do inhibited children show negative affects? What for event researchers say about uninhibited infants?
He regards shyness with strangers as a feature of a broad temperament category called inhibition to the unfamiliar.
•Beginning at 7-9 months, inhibited children show initial avoidance, distress, or subdued affect.
Inhibition generally shows some continuity, but a substantial number of inhibited infants become less so by age 7.
Recent research links early inhibition to later risk of social anxiety.
What did Rothbart and Bates argue for the three broad dimensions to the structure of temperament
Extraversion/surgency: approach, pleasure, activity, smiling, and laughter.
• Kagan’s uninhibited children.
Negative affectivity: fear, frustration, sadness, and discomfort; easily distressed.
•Kagan’s inhibited children.
Effortful control: self-regulation; attentional focusing and shifting, inhibitory control, perceptual sensitivity, and low-intensity pleasure.
• Self-regulation is linked to school readiness.
Gender may be an important factor shaping the
environmental context that influences temperament.
Parents react differently depending on whether the baby is a boy or a girl.
Expectancy effects and SP
Caregivers’ reactions depend in part on culture.
• Behavioral inhibition is more highly valued in China than in North America. and Chinese children are more inhibited.
Several types and dimensions during childhood with characterstics of adult personality
Temperaments in adulthood
Inhibition in adulthood
Easy and difficult temperaments: likely to be well adjusted as young adults.
Inhibition: linked to shyness; less likely as adults to be assertive or to experience social support, and more likely to delay entering a stable job track.
Ability to control one’s emotions: greater resilience; likely to continue to handle emotions effectively as adults.
Note these are based on a small number of studies.
Goodness of fit
And differential susceptibility and biological sensitivity
The match between a child’s temperament & the environmental demands the child must cope with
Basically how well a child’s temperament fits the environment
Ex: If a match is good, child is more likely to do well
-A shy kid might thrive in a calm and patient family.
Reciprocal relationships: child temperament affects parent and parents reaction affects the child
Both the differential susceptibility model (Belsky and Pleuss) and the biological sensitivity (Boyce and Ellis) to context model propose that characteristics that make children vulnerable to difficulty also make optimal growth possible when the conditions are very supportive.
Erik Erickson- Trust vs. Mistrust
Konrad Lorenz
Harry Harloc
Bowlby and Ainsworth
Erik: will my needs get met? Is the world safe?
Konrad Lorenz: imprinting of animals
Harry: importance of contact comfort
Bowlby and Ainsworth: attatchment model and secure base
Imprinting
species of animals form an attachment to the first large moving object that they meet.
•Process is innate
Caregiver- Child Attatchment Relationship
Harry Harlow
Harry Harlow
Experimental work with monkeys who were deprived of all early social interactions
Results strongly supported the view that healthy social and emotional development is rooted in children’s early social interactions with adults
Three experiments:
Showed innate need for contact
-fear response
-open field test and development of autonomy
Attachment and Joh Bowlby
Emotional bond with a specific person that endured space and time
John Bowlby and others
Observed institutionalized children and led to understanding of importance of parent-child interactions in development.
Bowlby, who laid the foundations of attachment theory, was influenced by psychoanalytic work and research on animals social behavior.
Bowlby: Attatchment theory what is it
Bowlby: Attachment theory
Influenced by ethological theory
Theorized children are biologically predisposed to develop attachments with caregivers as a means of increasing the chances of their own survival
Similar to the benefits of imprinting, but using a delayed learning mechanism.
Posited a secure base (i.e., attachment figure’s presence) provides young child sense of security that makes environmental exploration possible.
This is seen in the open field experiment of Harlow’s work.
What are Bowlby four phases of Attatchment
-Preattachment phase (birth to 6 weeks)
The infant produces innate signals that bring others to his or her side and is comforted by the interaction that follows
Attachment-in-the-making (6 weeks to 6-8 months)
The phase in which infants begin to respond preferentially to familiar people
Clear-cut attachment
(between 6-8 months and 1½-2 years)
Characterized by the infant’s actively seeking contact with their regular caregivers and typically showing separation protest or distress when the caregiver departs
Reciprocal relationships (from 1.5 or 2 years on)
Involves children taking an active role in developing working partnerships with their caregivers
Bowlby: Internal Working Model of Attachment
Children develop…
Working model guides….
Child develops a mental representation of the self, of attachment
figures, and of relationships in general.
Working model guides children’s interactions with caregivers and other people in infancy and at older ages.
• The primary care giver, the secure base, provides a specific role for the child above and beyond any other adult.
How It Works:
• If a baby has a secure, responsive caregiver:
• They develop a positive internal working model.
• They learn “I’m lovable, others are dependable.”
• This helps them form healthy relationships later in life.
If the caregiver is neglectful or inconsistent:
• The child may develop a negative model.
They might believe “I’m not worthy,” or “People can’t be trusted.”
• This can lead to insecurity or trouble with relationships in the future.
Attatchment theory Ainsworth
Mary Ainsworth
• Bowlby’s student who extended and tested his ideas
•Developed a laboratory procedure called “The Strange Situation” to assess infants’ attachment to their primary caregivers
Procedure
Child is exposed to seven episodes, including two separations and reunions with the caregiver and interactions with a stranger when alone and when the caregiver is in the room.
Identified attachment categories
• Secure attachment
• Insecure/resistant (or ambivalent) attachment
• Insecure/avoidant attachment
• Disorganized/disoriented attachment
Research strange situation
Procedure
• Child is exposed to seven episodes, including two separations and reunions with the caregiver and interactions with a stranger when alone and when the caregiver is in the room.
Identified attachment categories
• Secure attachment
• Insecure/resistant (or ambivalent) attachment
• Insecure/avoidant attachment
Disorganized/disoriented attachment
Secure attachment
is a pattern of attachment in which an infant or child has a high-quality, relatively unambivalent relationship with his or her attachment figure.
-Basically having strong and emotionally supportive as well as feeling sure about their caregivers love
In the Strange Situation, a securely attached infant, for example, may be upset when the caregiver leaves but may be happy to see the caregiver return, recovering quickly from any distress.
When children are securely attached, they can use caregivers as a secure base for exploration.
About two-thirds of American middle class children are securely attached.
Insecure/resistant (or ambivalent) attachment
is a pattern in which infants or young children (about 15% of American middle class childre are clingy and stay close to their caregiver rather than explore the environment.
In the Strange Situation, insecure/resistant infants tend to become very upset w the caregiver leaves them alone in the room, and are not readily comforted by strangers.
When the caregiver returns, they are not easily comforted and both seek comfo and resist efforts by the caregiver to comfort them.
Insecure/avoidant attachment
is a type of insecure attachment in which infants or young children (about 20% of infants from middle class U.S. families) seem somewhat indifferent toward their caregiver and may even avoid the caregiver.
• In the Strange Situation, these children seem indifferent toward their caregiver before the caregiver leaves the room and indifferent or avoidant when the caregiver returns.
If these children become upset when left alone, they are as easily comforted by a stranger as by the caregiver.
Disorganized/disoriented attachment was
subsequently identified because a small percentage of children did not fit into the other categories.
Infants in this category seem to have no consistent way of coping with the stress of the Strange Situation.
Their behavior is often confused or even contradictory, and they often appear dazed or disoriented.
• This is seen in a higher percentage of developmentally delayed children.
Strange situation shows…
Cultural Variations in Attachment
Infant behaviors in the Strange Situation are similar across numerous cultures, including China, Western Europe, and various parts of Africa.
Some important differences in behavior in the Strange Situation were found in certain other cultures.
• Example: Insecure attachment patterns in Japanese and U.S. infants
Adult Attachment
how they perceive and deal with closeness and emotional intimacy.
ability to communicate their emotions and needs, and listen to and understand the emotions and needs of their partners.
modes of responding to conflict. expectations about their partner and the relationship (internal working models).
Secure - autonomous
(Closeness and trust others)
Avoidant - dismissing
(Tries to avoid having emotional intimacy or closeness)
Anxious - preoccupied
(Crave closeness but Fear of getting rejected)
Disorganized - unresolved
(Unresolved trauma or inconsistent parenting)
Factors Associated with the Security of Children’s Attachmerit
Parental sensitivity
contributes to the security of an infant’s attachment.
Demonstration of sensitivity
• Responsive caregiving when children are distressed or upset
• Helping children to engage in learning situations by providing just enough, but not too much, guidance and supervision
Attatchment:
Interventions studies of parents being trained to do what…
Differences in Attatchment when children are at what ages
Intervention studies in which parents in an experimental group are trained to be more sensitive in their caregiving:
• Indicate a causal relationship between parental sensitivity and security of attachment (sensitive parenting leads to security)
Demonstrate differences in attachment when the children were 18 months, 24 months, and 3½ years old (followed up)
Does Security of Attachment Have Long-Term Effects?
Children who were securely attached as infants:
Seem to have closer, more harmonious relatiorships with peers than do insecurely
attached children
• Have positive peer and romantic relationships and emotional health in adolescence
Earn higher grades and are more involved in school than insecurely attached
children
