Developmental Flashcards
Describe the key terms into caregiver interaction
Reciprocity - description of how 2 people interact.
Turn taking - interaction flows between adult and infant
Sensitive responsiveness- adult attends sensitively to infants communications.
Social releases - how the baby signals e.g cry.
Evaluate the key terms into care giver interaction
STRENGTH - Tronick still face experiment. The mother had to not respond to any of the baby’s social releases. This caused heightened anxiety, then even more until the baby got bored and looked for someone else. Reciprocity affects attachment. Observational.
LIMITATION- it lacks internal validity because we don’t know exactly what the baby is telling us. So we could misinterpret it. (Subjective data).
Describe the interactional synchrony study into care giver interaction
Adults and baby’s respond in time to sustain communication.
Metzoff and Moore observed the baby’s beginnings of interactional synchrony in infants as young as 2 weeks old. An adult displayed 1 of 3 facial expressions. They found that the babies copied. OBSERVATIONAL RESEARCH.
Evaluate the interactional synchrony study into care giver interaction
STRENGTH - There will be no demand characteristics because the baby isn’t fully developed so they wouldn’t care about being filmed.
STRENGTH - Isabella et al high levels of synchrony is associated with a better quality of mother - infant attachment.
LIMITATION - Koepke failed to replicate Meltzoff and Moores study so it has low external/internal validity and low reliability.
Describe and evaluate a theory / study into care giver interaction
Reciprocity Turn taking Sensitive responsiveness Social releases Interactional synchrony
Describe the role of the farther
Gross an carried out a longitudinal study looking at the relationship with both parents. Farther’s role in attachment is for play and stimulation not nurturing.
babies attach to mum first, in only 3 percent of cases they attach to dad.
by 18 months 75% have an attachment to dad
smiling, holding and imitation are key behaviours which form attachments and are applicable to both mum and dad.
the key to attachment is responsiveness rather than gender
Evaluate the role of the farther
LIMITATION - McCallum and Golombuck found that children growing up in the same sex families or single parent families do not develop any differently FROM THOSE WITH TWO PARENTS.
LIMITATION- There is inconsistent findings because farther a can take on the nurturing roles.
LIMITATION- Not enough research into farthers
Describe animal studies into attachment - Lorenz
The geese were splint into 2 different groups one was kept with the mother and the other in an incubator were the first moving object they saw was Lorenz
The geese with mother imprinted on her and the ones with Lorenz imprinted on him
Evaluate animal study’s - Lorenz
LIMITATION- There is a problem with extrapolation (applying it from animals to humans). So we can’t generalise.
STRENGTH - Behaviouralist psychologists think you can generalise
What is the key terms for animal studies
Imprinting when a baby recognises another object/ person as a parent
Critical period- how long the baby’s have got to imprint
Describe animal study into attachment - Harlow
There was a wire mother monkey (who had food) and a cloth mother monkey (comfort) they were taken away from there real mothers at birth and placed with these.
They went to the cloth mother monkey over the wire mother monkey.
90 day critical period
Evaluate animal studies - Harlow
LIMITATION - the mother monkeys were called ‘iron maidens’ so Harlow himself was calling his experiment torture.
LIMITATION- the babies were less than 90 days old when they were taken away from there mothers.
STRENGTH - social workers can use this in there own practice to use key workers to create attachment.
Describe stages of attachment
Schaffer and Emmerson studied 60 babies 31 males and 29 females from working glass Glasgow families. They were visited every month for 1 year and then at 18 months. Infants attachment and separation anxiety was tested.
Between 25 - 32 weeks 50% of boys showed separation anxiety
By 40 weeks 80% showed specific attachment and 30 % showed multiple attachment.
Asocial stage (first few weeks) - No differentiation between humans and non humans. Indiscriminate attachment (2-7 months) they show preference to humans. Recognise familiar people. Specific Attachment (7 months) to those who attend there needs they have the strongest attachment. Multiple attachment (1 year) they have multiple attachments.
Evaluate stages of attachment
LIMITATION- limited sample which means it can’t be generalised because it has low population validity.
STRENGTH - The babies were at home which means we were will see their natural behaviour.
LIMITATION- social desirability bias.
LIMITATION - van ijendoorn babies make multiple attachments first. Collectivist cultures.
LIMITATION - not all babies will from attachments in this staging in sequence due to personal differences.
Outline study’s into learning theory
Dollard and Miller based off the original dog study
Unconditioned stimulus FOOD —–> unconditioned response HAPPY BABY
Neutral stimulus MUM —–> neutral response
MUM + FOOD ——> unconditioned response
conditioned stimulus MUM ——> Conditioned response HAPPY BABY
Operant conditions
Where you reward for becoming attached primary reinforced FOOD Secondary reinforcer MUM
Evaluate study’s into learning theory
STRENGTH - behaviouralist psychologists say you can generalise animal to human studies.
LIMITATION - there is problems with extrapolation so you can’t generalise
LIMITATION - food is not the main priority in attachment its comfort (Harlow)
LIMITATION - Schaffer and Emmerson states that the baby’s aren’t attached to those who feed them but those who comfort them.
LIMITATION - Bowlbys theory
Describe Bowlbys theory of attachment - key terms
Monotropy - where you have one primary attachment figure when you are a baby (what Bowlbys believes)
Social realises - when a baby signals to gain the attachment of an adult.
Critical period- you have 2 years to make that primary attachment in humans otherwise you will never make another attachment.
Sensitive period - where the relationship must be maintained for 2-5 years to make it secure
Evaluate Bowlbys theory into attachment - key terms
STRENGTH- Tronicks research - blank face experiment backs social releases.
LIMITATION- temporal validity it was done a long time ago so may be outdated for today’s society
LIMITATION - Van ijenzendoorn collectivist cultures.
Outline Bowlbys theory of attachment - internal working model
From this monotropic attachment the baby forms a mental model of what relationships are meant to be like. They will use this for future relationships.
Evaluate Bowlbys theory of attachment - internal working model
STRENGTH- Bailey et al, they assessed 99 mothers with one year old babies with the quality of the relationship they had with their mothers. And then assed their relationship with their baby’s now. If they reported a bad relationship then they had a poor relationship now .
LIMITATION - Learning theory
Describe research into strange situation.
Mum and baby go into a play room (proximity seeking)
Child is encouraged to explore (secure base)
Caregiver leaves (separation anxiety)
Stranger enters (stranger anxiety)
Caregiver returns (response to union)
Findings :
Secure attachment 60-75% moderate reactions
Insecure avoidant attachment 20-25% no reactions
Insecure resistant attachment 3% huge reactions
Evaluate the strange situation research
LIMITATION - low internal validity people replicated aims worthy study and found a new attachment group (disorganised attachment) they have a mixture of all 3.
LIMITATION- observational design so has demand characteristics from the mother
STRENGTH - Has high inter rate reliability. Bick found that 94% of the trails observed agreed on the attachment classification. Valid measurement of attachment.
LIMITATION - Takahashi found the study can not be generalised in different cultures. In Japan it could not be measured as the baby’s are never left alone so the procedure has to change depending on the culture.
Describe the research into cultural differences. Van ijzendoorn
They reviewed 32 studies of strange situations over 8 different countries. 15 were from the USA.
Britain had the highest rate of secure behaviour
Germany had the highest rate of avoidant
Israel had the highest resistant
There was completely different results within USA
Evaluate cultural variations in attachment
STRENGTH- large sample. Reduce anomalies. High population validity.
LIMITATION- it doesn’t represent sub cultures as all the different cultures are not included. The sample that could be used is stratified.
LIMITATION - imposed ethic. A meta analysis was ran the type of experiment used on American children couldn’t be used on German children.
LIMITATION- Jin et al did a study to compare the attachment types in Korea to others. They found that results were similar and only 1/87 children were avoidant. Similar to Japan
LIMITATION- Takahashi found the study can’t be generalised in different cultures.
Describe research into the influence of childhood to adult relationships.
Internal working model - that your first ever relationship makes the bases of all culture relationships.
Hozan and shaver analysed 620 love quiz responses printed in an American newspaper. First section tested responses to current/ most important relationships. Second section assessed general love experiences.
56% secure
25% avoidant
19% resistant.
Evaluate research into the influence of childhood and adult relationships.
LIMITATION- self report techniques. Interviews/ questionaires. Social desirability bias. Lacks validity.
STRENGTH- peer relationships bullying. Smith et al. Secure - not involved. Avoidant - the ones who get bullied. Resistant - bully.
LIMITATION- Zimmerman rejected the internal working model. They found that there was simerlarity in childhood attachment type and adolescent.
STRENGTH - Bailys research into research about s generations.
Describe Bowlbys theory into maternal deprivation.
Bowlby stated that if a child was separated from there mothers it would have serious damage to the child’s emotional and intellectual development.
44 thieves: 44 teenagers who were accused of stealing. They were interviewed for signs of affection less psychopathology. The parents were also interviewed to see if they had a long period of separation. A group of non criminals but emotionally disturbed teenagers were also set up to see if separation also occurred.
14/44 boys were affection less psychopathologists
12 had experienced long term separation.
He validated his own theory.
Evaluate Bowlbys theory of maternal deprivation
LIMITATION- experimenter bias. Validated his own theory.
LIMITATION - confounding variables. Most were conducted during ww2. Other factors would have been included.
LIMITATION - lewis repeated on 500 teenagers and found that prolonged separation wasn’t the cause.
LIMITATION- koluchva. The twin boys who had separation from there mother for 7 years. They then got adopted by a loving couple and developed normally.
STRENGTH - Goldfart et al followed 30 orphaned children to the age of 12. 6 fostered by 4 months. Where as the rest remained in the orphanage. Foster group IQ - 96. Orphange IQ- 68
Describe research into internationalisation
Rutters Romanian orphans - 165 orphans were adopted to Britain. Their cognitive and emotional development were tested at 4,6,11 and 15 years old and were compared to 52 British children adopted at the same time. The mean IQ for children adopted before 6 months was 102. From 6 months to 2 years 86. For those after 2 years it was 77. Those who where adopted after 6 months showed an attachment type called disinhibited attachment.
Evaluate research into internationalisation
STRENGTH- This study has no confounding variables in terms of trauma unlike previous so has high internal validity.
LIMITATION- the orphanage the Romanian orphans went to was not a very good one. It lacked intellectual stimulation. So therefore you can’t generalise.
STRENGTH- the care system has benefited from this study, to make sure that each child has a key worker. They can now develop attachments with the key worker.
STRENGTH - Bucharest ran a study where he assed the attachment type of 95 children from 12-31 months who had spent most of their time in an institution and a control group who had never. There attachment type was measured using strange situation. 74% control were secure only 19% of the institution group. 65% week disorganised and 44% disinhibited.
LIMITATION - they don’t know long term effects.
