Lecture 5- Childhood Attachment Flashcards
What did Bowlby sate about infants?
Infants should experience warm, intimate, and continuous relationship with their mother
What are the three stages of Mourning- maternal deprivation?
1) Protest (strong expectations of return)
2) Despair (withdrawn and inactive)
3) Detachment (Loss of all interest)
Describe Harlow’s study?
1) 2 surrogate mothers (Rhesus monkey)
2) moved the bottle from one mother to the other
3)more likely to gravitate to the cloth mother than wired mother
What is Attachment?
1) Infant enduring affective tie to caregiver that develops over time
2) Infants born with a biological push to form attachments
3) for survival and protection
What is not attachment?
1) Not parents bond to infant
2) Imprinting
What are the functions of attachment?
1) Survival
2) Protection from predators
3) Physical and emotional safety
What is the attachment system for survival?
1) Monitor threat
2) Check safety setting
3) Use attachment behaviours (crying, crawling, and calling)
4) Repeat 3 and 4 if needed
What are the survival threat types?
1) External
- Dangerous situations
2) Internal
- Illness, fatigue, hunger, cold
3) Threats to Proximity
- Separation
What is the safety setting?
1) Proximity of caregiver (physically close)
2) Felt security (Scroufe, 1976), emotionally close
How does monitoring benefit infants?
1) tells infants to get close or to explore
Define Attachment bx?
- behaviour that decreases proximity to a caregiver
- behaviour that increases ‘felt security’
State the types of attachment bx
1) Signalling (Smiling, crying, babbling)
2) Approaching (following, holding, seeking)
What is an attachment figure?
1) A person an infant directs their attachment bx too
2) A person who spends the most time, quality care, and emotional investment in infant
What was Bowlby’s hypothesis?
- caregivers responsiveness is related to individual differences in attachment security
- these individual differences have consequences for later personality development an interpersonal relating
What was Ainsworth study?
Strange situation
1) Series of episodes in which infant and parent are separated and reunited twice
2) Three basic organizations of infant-mother attachment
3) Related to mothers caregiving behaviours
State the three attachment styles
Secure
Avoidant
Ambivalent
Describe the Secure attachment style in the strange situation study?
1) mother= secure base
2) Separation= signs of missing parent
3) reunion= Actively greets mum signals for contact
$) soothed by contact and returns to exploring
How does the mother behave so the infant can develop a secure attachment style?
- accepting, emotionally and physically accessible, responsive
- warm & pleasant contact
- secure base and safe haven
Describe the avoidant attachment style in a strange situation study?
1) Explore little but little or no secure base bx
2) separation= little or no signs of missing the parent
3) reunion= unresponsive
4) fails to find comfort in mother
How does the mother behave so the infant can develop an avoidant attachment style?
- Mother is least sensitive, more rejecting
- unpleasant or infrequent physical contact
- no safe haven
Describe the Ambivalent Attachment style in the strange situation study?
1) Fails to explore, visibly distressed
2) Separation= distressed
3) reunion= alternates between wanting contact & angry rejection
4) Fails to find comfort in mother
How does the mother behave so the infant can develop an ambivalent attachment style?
- Generally accepting but less sensitive, inconsistent
- less cooperative
- no secure base
When is secure attachment most likely?
1) parents are sociable, affectionate, and agreeable
2) Infant perceived as positive
3) low marital conflict and social support
How does a secure attachment style affect pre school?
1) more independent
2) believe they can succeed
3) more positive self-image
4) seen as empathetic
How does an avoidant attachment style affect pre- school?
1) more dependent on teachers
2) lack confidence
3) Lower persistence in problem-solving
4) seen negatively
5) more likely to show aggression
What is an internal working model of attachment?
Mental representation is formed through a child’s early experiences with their primary caregiver
What does a secure internal working model look like?
1) Self- confident
2) others are there when i need them
3) strong emotions are manageable
What does an avoidant internal working model look like?
1) act independent even when uncertain
2) can’t rely on others for comfort
3) strong emotions won’t get them where they need, so should hide them
What does an ambivalent internal working model look like?
1) not confident unable to work on their own
2) others ae inconsistent in their care
3) strong emotions are hard to mange on their own
What is disorganised attachment?
1) not organized by clear style
2) associated with prior trauma and attachment trauma
3) both avoidant and fearful characteristics
4) signs of dissociations and inappropriate humour
what is the importance of Internal working model?
contributes to emotional regulation and psychic organization
