measuring attachment

Question 1

Ainsworth strange situation aim and method

Answer 1

aimed to investigate and measure the quality of an infants attachment to their mothers using objective+scientific procedure
- controlled observation, series of stages and at each stage an observation of the childs response is recorded
- child and caregiver enter unfamiliar room, child encouraged to explore, stranger comes in and tries to interact with child, caregiver leaves stranger and child together, caregiver returns and stranger leaves, caregiver leaves child alone, stranger then caregiver returns 3 mins per episode

Question 2

Ainsworth strange situation results

Answer 2

3 types of attachment:
* secure attachment type B - explore hapily but regularly go back to caregiver, moderate seperation distress, and stranger anxiety, require and accept comfort
* insecure-avoidant type A - children explore freely but dont seek proximity or show secure base behaviour, little to no reaction when caregiver leaves, and little effort for contact when they return, little stranger anxiety and dont require comfort
* insecure-resistant type C - seek greater proximity and explore less, huge stranger and seperation distress but resist comfort when reunited

Question 3

Ainsworth strange situation evaluations

Answer 3

• further research by Main and Solomon suggests a fourth type called disorganised, which appears as confused and apprehensive with no consistent results to strange situation, closely linked to those suffered from abuse
• carried out in lab, all variables are controlled and EVs are eliminated, internal validity, however could be argued different behvaiour shown as unfamiliar environment
• good inter-rater reliability, different observers watched the same thing, behavioural categories were used so observers agreed on most things, Bick found 94% agreed on attachment types

Question 4

cultural variations of strange situation, Takahashi study

Answer 4

used 60 middle class Japanese infants under 12 months, found 68% were securely attached, 32% were insecure-resistant and non insecure-avoidant, when the infants were left alone they became so distressed that it had to be abandoned, their cultural values make it impolite to avoid interacting and children are taught this from an early age which could account for lack of insecure-avoidant also Japanese spend almost 100% time in contact with mothers which may explain why they were so distressed

Question 5

cultural variations of strange situation, Van Ljzendoorn study

Answer 5

wanted to look at proportions of secure, insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant attachments across a range of countries, meta analysis of 32 SSP studies, 8 countries, 1990 mother-infant pairs
results:
* inter-cultural differences - most common was secure 75%, next common was insecure-avoidant apart from Israel and Japan who were both collectivist cultures
* intra-cultural differences - greater variation within one culture than between culture
=main type is same in all cultures so drive to form an attachment is innate

Question 6

evaluations of cross cultural research

Answer 6

• large sample-nearly 2000 babies used in Ljzendoorns study = increases internal validity by reducing impact of anomalous results + representative
• unrepresentative of culture, comparisons were made between countries not cultures