Development Psychology - Social and Emotional Development Flashcards
Attachment
A deep, affectionate, close and enduring relationship with the person with whom a baby has shared many experiences
Attachment theory
We observe:
> Proximity seeking behaviours in infants
> Apparent goal system focussed on specific attachment figure.
Balance stuck between two opposing goals:
> To explore the world
> To seek comfort and proximity
Development of attachment
Appears to be a behaviour pattern necessary for normal development
Development stages:
> Stranger anxiety (6-12 months) – fearful responses, crying and clinging
> Separation anxiety (6 months, peaking at 15) – signs of distress at being left in an unfamiliar setting
John Bowlby (1951)
Children raised in orphanages after the war, deprived of love, became emotionally withdrawn and depressed
He viewed attachment as very important for keeping infants close to caregivers, and so safe.
‘Mother love is as important for development as vitamins and minerals’
Formation of attachment (Lorenzo)
Imprinting - adaptive, evolutionary, automated
Formation of attachment (Harlow - 1959)
Demonstrated importance of forming attachments with monkey experiment
Monkeys taken from mother and given choice of fake ‘mothers
> Forced to choose between food and comfort
> They chose comfort, grabbed food then went back to comfort
Maternal deprivation (Bowlby 1944)
Retrospective study of childhood experiences of juvenile delinquents
> They shared history of being taken into care
Bowlby proposed that significant separations between child and caregiver would have serious deleterious effect on child
Robertsons’ studies (1950s)
Children taken into hospital. They studied affects of separation from parents
Affects were bad.
Maternity sensitivity
> Central concept - levels of maternity responsiveness and sensitivity create attachment bond
Evolutionary sense, adaptive - sensitive parenting leads to fulfilment of needs
Infants are uncomfortable if parents unresponsive - still face technique
Ainsworth (1967)
Bowlby was more concerned with making and breaking of attachments, Ainsworth interested in quality of attachments
Ganda tribe of Uganda > multiple attachments.
He returned to the US to study patterns of attachments and created a classifications of attachment types/patterns
Strange situation (Ainsworth and Wittig, 1969)
Used to assess infant’s attachment relationship. A brief, structured laboratory test based on home based observations of attachment relationship
Procedure:
> Mother and baby in room alone (3 mins)
> Stranger enters and talks to baby and mother (3 minutes)
> Mother leaves, baby and stranger alone (3 minutes)
> Mother returns, stranger leaves. Mother comforts child if needed and withdraws to chair (3 mins)
> Mother leaves, baby alone (3 mins)
> Stranger returns to comfort baby then settle in chair (3 mins)
> Mother returns, stranger leaves. (3 mins)
Categories created based on infant’s reactions
Categories of infant attachment
Type A > infants don’t show distress on separation or on reunion. Avoid physical contact, tend to ignore. Mothers appear psychologically unavailable and fail to meet infants’ needs
Type B> infants use attachment figure as secure base from which to explore. Mothers are sensitive and aware of infants. Infants may be distressed on separation but are easily comforted on reunion
Type C> infants show considerable distress on separation and cannot be comforted on reunion - show resistance to mother. Infants very passive and uninterested, or angry and expressive and may reject mother
Type D> no set pattern. Behaviour is disorganised
After strange situation
> It’s widely used to assess infants’ attachment strategies
Later in childhood an increasing need to assess how attachment develops
Observation of separations could not be used as children were more able to conceal responses, so more complex ways to assess attachment necessary - separation anxiety test
Separation anxiety test (SAT) (Klagsbrun and Bowlby - 1976)
Self-projective test
> Photographs of separation situations shown to a child to elicit an attachment response
> These responses transcribed verbatim and coded. There are now many versions of this test with different emphasises
SAT for middle childhood (adapted by Wright, 1993)
Age range 7-10 years Nine pictures depicting separation situations Child asked: > how do you think the child feels? > Why would the child feel this way? > What would the child do?
