Influence of early attachment on later relationships

Question 1

What is the Internal working model?

Answer 1

• It suggests that a baby’s first relationship with primary caregiver leads to a mental representation of this relationship.
• The internal working model then acts as a template for future childhood and adult relationships.
• Template affects future relationships - loving first relationships = think all relationships are like that, bad first relationships = think all relationships are like that.
• Can lead to them struggling to form relationships in the first place or seeking functional relationships even if they are not healthy (its what they have previously experienced so think is normal) and not behaving appropriately within them, i.e displaying insecure-avoidant or insecure-resistant behaviours towards friends or partners.

Question 2

What is the importance of relationships in childhood?

Answer 2

• Attachment type is associated with the quality of peer relationships in childhood
• securely attached go on to form strong/best quality childhood friendships, whereas insecurely attached babies later have friendship difficulties
• in particular, bullying can be predicted by attachment type
• studies show that secure attached children are unlikely to be involved in bullying, insecure-avoidant were most likely to be victims and insecure-resistant children were most lily to be bullies

Question 3

How does this affect relationships in adulthood?

Answer 3

• the internal working model affects romantic relationships and parental relationships
• people tend to base their parenting style on their internal working model so attachment types tend to be passed on through generations of family

Question 4

What was Hazan and Shaver’s (1987) study?

Answer 4

The love quiz

Procedure:
- analysed 620 replies to a ‘love quiz’ printed in a local American newspaper
- quiz had 3 sections
- first assessed respondents current or most important relationship
- second section assessed general love experiences such as number of partners
- third section assessed attachment type by asking respondents to choose which of three statements best described their feelings

Findings and conclusion:
- 56% of respondents were identified as securely attached
- 25% insecure-avoidant
- 19% insecure-resistant
- those reporting secure attachments were the most likely to have goods and longer-lasting romantic experiences
- the avoidant respondents tended to reveal jealousy and fear of intimacy
These findings suggest that patterns of attachment behaviour are reflected in romantic relationships

Question 5

What is the evaluation for the influence of early attachment on later relationships?

Answer 5

Research support:
- reviews of evidence linking attachment to later development have concluded that early attachment consistently predicts later attachment (both with children and and romantically)
- whilst insecure-avoidant seems to convey faulty mild disadvantages for development, disinhibited attachment is strongly associated with later mental disorder
This means that secure attachment as a baby appears to convey advantages for future development while disorganised attachment appears to seriously disadvantage children

Validity issues with retrospective studies:
- most studies into early attachment and later development are not longitudinal
- instead researchers ask adult participants questions about their relationships with parents, and identify attachment type from this
- this causes two validity problems:
Asking questions relies on honesty and accurate perception of the participants
Secondly, it is very hard to know whether what is being assessed is early attachment or in fact adult attachment
This means hat the measures of easy attachment used in most studies may be confounded with other factors making them meaningless

Confounding variables:
- parenting style may influence both attachment quality and later development
- alternatively, genetically-influenced personality may be an influence on both factors
This means that we can never be entirely sure that it is early attachment and not some other factor that is influencing later development

Balancing opportunity and risk:
- insecure attachment does not increase risk of later developmental problems - no one is doomed to be the victim of bullying or to never have a successful romantic relationship as a result of their early attachment, its just a question of increased likelyhood
- by knowing someones attachment status we have an opportunity to intervene and help their development
- however, we may also become too pessimistic and create a self-fulfilling prophecy