Schaffer's stages of attachment Flashcards
Give Schaffer’s procedure
Observational study on 60 babies
Glasgow, skilled working-class families
Researchers visited the babies and mums at home every month for the 1st year and again at 18 months
Mothers were asked questions about their babies’ reactions in 7 everyday separations - eg. adult leaving the room (measuring separation anxiety)
Researchers also assessed stranger anxiety - response to unfamiliar people
How many babies were in Schaffer’s observational study?
60
What happened between 25-32 weeks of age?
50% of babies showed signs of separation anxiety towards a specific adult (usually mum)
Attachment tends to be towards who?
The caregiver who was the most responsive to the infants signals and facial expressions (reciprocity)
Attachment did not depend on who fed the child
What happened by 40 weeks of age?
80% of babies had specific attachments 30% displayed multiple attachments
What is Schaffer’s stage 1 of attachment?
Asocial stage
What age regards the asocial stage?
0-8 weeks
Describe behaviour in the asocial stage of attachment
Babies have no discrimination between humans, they accept comfort from anyone. They have a slight preference for humans over non-humans (like objects and animals)
What is Schaffer’s stage 2 of attachment?
Indiscriminate attachment
What age regards the indiscriminate attachment stage?
2-7 months
Describe behaviour in the indiscriminate attachment stage
Babies can tell people apart. Stronger bonds start to grow with familiar adults, however babies will usually still accept cuddles and comfort from any person. They do not usually show separation anxiety or stranger anxiety
What is Schaffer’s stage 3 of attachment?
Specific attachment
What age regards the specific attachment stage?
7-12 months
Describe behaviour in the specific attachment stage
Strong displays of separation anxiety and distress in the company of strangers. At this point the baby has formed a specific attachment (this person is called the primary attachment figure and is the person who offers the most interaction to the baby’s ‘signals’)
What is Schaffer’s stage 4 of attachment?
Multiple attachments
What age regards the multiple attachments stage?
1 year onwards
Describe behaviour in the specific attachment stage
Attachment with the primary caregiver grows and there is an increased interest in developing bonds with others (secondary attachments)
What is temporal validity?
The extent we can generalise results to other times in history eg. today
Give 3 strengths of Schaffer’s research
- Good external validity - Most of the observations were made by parents doing ordinary activities - then reported to the researchers
If the researchers were making the observations they could have distracted them or caused distress
Therefore it is likely that the babies behaved naturally while being observed - Validity of research checked - They compared the mother’s self-report with observations of the baby’s behaviour when the researchers visited their home eg. when the mother left the room
They found that the interview data matched their observations 92% of the time - Real world application - Schaffer’s stages have a practical application in day care
In the asocial and indiscriminate attachment stage day care is likely to be easier as babies can be comforted by any skilled adult
Schaffer and Emerson’s research shows that starting day care with an unfamiliar adult may be more problematic during the specific attachment stage
Give 3 limitations of Schaffer’s research
- Low temporal validity - Parental care has changed since the 1960s
More women go to work so children are cared for by other people/ places
Stay at home dads have quadrupled since the 1960s
We cannot conclude that stages of attachment would be the same today - Cultural bias - The theory suggests that the stages are inflexible
EG. that it is normal for single attachments to come before multiple attachments
However, in other collectivist cultures, multiple attachments may be formed from the outset
This suggests that the stage model applies only to individualist cultures - Observations and ethical issues - Mothers are unlikely to be objective observers
They might have been biased in what they observed/ reported or didn’t record certain things because they didn’t want their parenting to be questioned
They might not have noticed signs or misremembered them
Even if the babies behaved naturally, their behaviour may not have been recorded accurately
