Lesson 2 - The development of an attachment

Question 1

Schaffer and Emerson (1964)

Answer 1

• 31 male and 29 female infants of 5-23 weeks from working class families in Glasgow and their mothers were visited in their homes every four weeks for a year and then at 18 months.
• The mothers would report their infants behaviour to seven situations at every visit: left alone in a room, left with other people, left in a pram outside of the house, left in a pram outside the shops, left in their cot at night, put down after being held by an adult, passed by while sitting in their cot.
• The mothers were asked to describe the intensity of the child’s protest which was then rated on a four point scale.
• They measured separation and stranger anxiety
• 65% of babies were primarily attached to the mother
• 30% of babies were jointly attached to the mother + one other
• 3% were attached to the father
• 27% were jointly attached to the mother and father.
• Those who had better quality of CG interaction were more deeply attached. Quality > Quantity

Question 2

Stages of Development

Answer 2

• 0-3 months: Pre-attachment/asocial stage. Baby behaves similarly to inanimate objects and humans. By six months, the baby would show preference to humans and familiar faces.
• 3-6/7 months: Indiscriminate phase. Infants do not show separation or stranger anxiety but prefer familiar adults, but not to a singular adult.
• 7-8 months: Discriminate phase. Infants begin to show separation and stranger anxiety. They have formed an attachment with a primary figure.
• 9 months onwards: Multiple attachments. Infants form secondary attachments and show separation anxiety to these figures.

Question 3

Importance of secondary relationships

Answer 3

• Bowlby said that relationships were hierarchical and that the secondary attachments were minor compared to the primary.
• Rutter (1995) disputed this saying that they were of equal importance in building the infants internal working model.

Question 4

Strengths of Schaffer and Emerson (1964)

Answer 4

• It had good external validity as the scenarios were all everyday conditions and they were carried out by the parents. No one would have showed demand characteristics.
• The same mothers and infants were longitudinally studied over an 18 months period. This increased internal validity as there would be no confounding variables like individual differences.
• Consent was obtained and there were no ethical issues.

Question 5

Weaknesses of Schaffer and Emerson (1964)

Answer 5

• As self reports were used, mothers may have shown social desirability bias. They want to be seen as having a good relationship. As well as this, they may have shown bias as it is their own child in observing their behaviour.
• As the sample were all working class families, the results may not apply to other classes.
• It may lack temporal validity as family and parenting techniques and dynamics have changed considerably over the last 60 years, as many fathers have a closer relationship to their child, paternal leave etc.
• Bowlby (1969) stated that the adults who infants show separation anxiety to may not necessarily be an attachment but just a play mate.
• Tronick et al (1992) carried out cross-cultural research and saw that forming multiple attachments is the norm, as opposed to other researches that state that a primary attachment needs to be formed FIRST before secondaries.