Psychology (Cassibba et al. - Attachment) Flashcards
Cassibba et al. (AIM)
To investigate the universality of attachment in Italian children compared to American children.
Cassibba et al. (PROCEDURE)
Meta analysis using an italian database from “psychINFO”
Cassibba et al. Sample?
of studies (where they found them, did they screen any out, and from what time did they take them?) psychINFO database, using SSP and AAI procedures, 2885 pps 67 studies (2258 SSP 50 studies and 627 AAI 17 studies) from 1990 to 2009 that were only using the gold standards for AAI and SSP in order to avoid anomalous results. Italy has one of the lowest European womens indexes, are mostly catholic and have collectivist and individualistic orientations.
Cassibba et al. (FINDINGS)
For SSP: 53% Type B for non-clinical children and a higher percentage of avoidant attachment types compared to the US sample. For SSP: 32% type B for clinical/at risk children and an overall higher percentage of insecure attachment types compared to the US sample.
For AAI: 22% type D (dismissed) and if violence was involved it was 52% type D
Cassibba et al. (CONCLUSIONS)
an underrepresentation of unresolved attachment (Type U) could be due to the italians religious faith. Non-clinical children in the SSP were mostly securely attached.
Cassibba et al. (STRENGTHS)
Reliable because they used both SSP and AAI which are credible ways of determining one’s attachment
The use of SSP and AAI also makes it representative of the population because it includes infant and adult attachment.
Has used a large sample for both AAI and SSP (2885 pps 67 studies)
Internal validity as it only used studies with the gold standard for each SSP and AAI
Objective because it used quantitative data
Cassibba et al. (WEAKNESSES)
Not generalizable (ethnocentric) to other cultures because it only used Italian children and adults and compared it to American samples.
Not ecologically valid because SSP is conducted artificially
May have a level of subjectivity because there might be researcher bias involved in the selection process of the studies, excluding other studies.
Not ethical in the respect of the low secure attachment rates being the product of “bad” parenting, there is a chance that Italian parents (most importantly mothers) will feel bad about themselves if they get sight of that statistic.
It is also reductionistic because it is a sort of cross-sectional study which is where a study looks at a sample in only one specific point in time. This is negative because then there is no way of knowing how child attachment in Italy is as a whole which makes it unreliable as well.
It is not valid because the italian sample is from 1990 to 2009 and the American sample from 1969 onwards, which could make them time locked as 21 years worth of extra american attachment studies have been taken as a direct comparison, which would skew the results compared to if they were taken from the same time period as the italian sample.
Explain one way in which it could be improved.
Make it less time locked by looking back at how Italian studies of attachment progressed over time, going way back as close as you can compared to the US studies (1969)
