Schaffer's stages of attachment Flashcards
stages of attachment
many developmental theories identify a sequence of qualitatively different behaviours linked to specific ages. Behaviours are linked to specific ages - all babies go through them in the same order
multiple attachments
attachments to two or more people. Most babies appear to develop multiple attachments once they have formed one strong attachment to one of their carers
Stage 1 - Asocial stage
In a baby’s first few weeks of life, its observable behaviour towards humans and inanimate objects is similar .
Schaffer and Emerson did not believe that it is entirely asocial because even at this stage babies show signs that they prefer to be with other people. `
Babies also tend to show a preference for the company of familiar people and are more easily comforted by them
At this stage the baby is bonding with certain people and these form the basis of later attachments
Stage 2 - Indiscriminate attachment
From 2- 7 months babies start to display more obvious and observable social behaviours
They show a clear preference for being with other humans rather than inanimate objects
They recognise/ prefer the company of familiar people
At this point babies tend to accept cuddles and comfort from anyone
They do not tend to show separation anxiety when caregivers leave their presence or stranger anxiety in the presence of unfamiliar people
stage 3: specific attachment
From around 7 months most babies start to display the classic signs of attachment towards one particular person
These signs include anxiety directed towards strangers , especially when the attachment figure is absent and anxiety when separated from their attachment figure
At this point the baby is said to have formed a specific attachment
The person who the attachment is on is called the PRIMARY ATTACHMENT FIGURE
They are not necessarily the person who spends the most time, but offers the most interaction and responds to the baby’s signals with the most skill
The baby’s mother in 65% cases
Stage 4 - multiple attachments
After babies show attachment behaviour towards one person, they usually extend the behaviour to multiple attachments with other people who they regularly spend time with
These relationships are called SECONDARY ATTACHMENTS
Schaffer and Emerson observed that 29% of children formed secondary attachments within a month of forming a primary attachment.
By the age of one year the majority of babies had developed multiple attachments
Schaffer and Emersons procedure?
60 babies , 31 boys, 29 girls. All from Glasgow and most from skilled working class families. Researchers visited babies / mothers in their own homes every month for the first year then again at 18 months
The researchers asked the mothers questions about the kind of behaviour showed in 7 day separations such as adult leaving the room
This was designed to measure the babies’ attachment
The researchers also assessed stranger anxiety, the babies’ anxiety response to unfamiliar people
FINDINGS: they identified four distinct stages in the development of infant attachment behaviour
STRENGTH - Good external validity
a strength of Schaffer and Emerson’s research is that it has good external validity.
Most of the observations were made by parents during ordinary activities and reported to the researchers
The alternative would have bee to have researchers present to record the observations
This could have distracted the babies or made them more anxious
This means that it is highly likely that the pp’s behaved naturally while being observed
COUNTERPOINT
: but there are issues with asking the mothers to be the ‘observers’.
They were unlikely to be objective observers
They might have been biased in terms of what they noticed and what they reported
- for example they may have not noticed when their baby was showing signs of anxiety or could have misremembered it
This means that even if babies behaved naturally, their behaviour may have not been accurately recorded
LIMITATION poor evidence for the asocial stage
One limitation of the Schaffer and Emerson staged is the validity of the measures they used to assess attachment in the asocial stage.
Young babies have poor coordination and are fairly immobile.
If babies less than two months felt anxiety in everyday situations they might have displayed this in quite subtle , hard to observe ways
This made it difficult for mothers to observe and report back to the researcher on the signs of anxiety and attachment in this age group
This means that the babies may actually be quite social but because of flawed methods, they appear asocial
STRENGTH real world application
Another strength of Schaffer and Emerson’s stages is that they have practical application in day care.
In the asocial and indiscriminate attachment stages day-care is likely to be straightforward as babies can be comforted by any skilled adult.
But Schaffer and Emerson’s research tells us that day care , especially starting day-care with an unfamiliar adult may be problematic during the specific attachment age
This means that parents’ use of day care can be planned using Schaffer and Emerson’s stages.
GENERALISABILITY
On the positive side Schaffer and Emerson based their stage account on a large scale study with some good design features
On the other hand, they only looked at one sample which had unique features in terms of the cultural and historical context - 1960s working class Glasgow
In other cultures , for example collectivist cultures, multiple attachments from a very early age are more the norm
