Cultural Variations In Attachment

Question 1

Cultural variations def

Answer 1

Culture refers to the norms and values that exist within any group of people.
Cultural variations then are the differences in norms and values that exist between people in different groups.
In attachment research we are concerned with the differences in the proportion of children of different attachment types

Question 2

Van Ijzendoorn procedure

Answer 2

Procedure- the researchers located 32 studies of attachment where the SS had been used to investigate the proportion of infants with different attachment types. These studies were conducted in eight countries. Over al the 32 sutures yielded results for 1990 children. The data was meta analysed

Question 3

Van ijzendoorn findings

Answer 3

There was a wide variation between the proportions of attachment types in different studies. Secure was the most common in all countries.
However this varied from 75% in U.K. to 50% in China
Insecure was 3% U.K. and 30% in Israel
ACTUALLY found that biggest variations were within countries/cultures! One part of USA 46% compared to another part where 90% were securely attached

Question 4

Italian study

Answer 4

Simonella et al 2015
Conducted study in Italy to see whether proportions of babies of different attachment types still matches those found in precious studies.
-assessed 76 12 month olds using strange situation
-found 50% secure 36% insecure accident
-this is a lower rate of secure attachment found in many studies
- because of mothers working now, kids in childcare
-these findings suggest that cultural changes can make dramatic difference to patterns of secure and insecure attachment

Question 5

Korean study

Answer 5

Jin et al 2012
Conducted a study to compare the proportions of attachment types in Korea to other studies. Using SS
-similar results to van ijzendoorn in China
-because Korea and China have similar child rearing practices
-attachment types are due to child rearing Styles

Question 6

Conclusions

Answer 6

Secure attachment seems to be the norm in a wide range of cultures, supporting bowlbys idea that attachment is innate and universal and this type is the universal norm
-CULTRUAL PRACTICES DO HAVE AN INFLUENCE ON ATTACHMENT TYPE

Question 7

Evaluation large samples

Answer 7

A strength of combining the results of attachment studies carried out in different counties is ending up with a large sample size

This increases internally validity by reducing the impact of anomalous results caused by bad methodology or very unusual participants

Question 8

Evaluation- samples tend to be unrepresentative of culture

Answer 8

The meta analysis by van ijzendoorn claimed to study cultures variations when in fact the variations were actually country variations.
- this means that comparisons between countries may have little meaning- the particular cultural characteristics and thus caregiving styles of the sample need to be specified

Question 9

Evaluation method of assessment is biased

Answer 9

Cross cultural psychology includes the ideas of witchcraft and smug.

• Etic means cultural universals whilst enrich means cultural uniqueness
• the strange situation was designed by an American researcher based on a British theory.
• there is a question as to whether Anglo American theories and assessments can be applied to other cultures
• in Germany lack of separation anxiety is seen more of independence rather than avoidance