What is an attachment and methods in attachment research Flashcards
What is a caregiver?
Main person responsible for caring.
What is an attachment?
The strong, emotional bond, formed in early childhood, between a baby and their caregiver. It is long lasting.
State all 3 main behaviours that babies exhibit when they have a strong attachment.
safe base behaviour, separation anxiety, stranger anxiety.
explain what safe base behaviour is.
When children have an attachment to their caregiver, they treat their caregiver as a safe base, meaning someone they can immediately return to, if they feel scared or anxious.
When the caregiver is nearby, they are happy and willing to explore.
Explain what separation anxiety is
Separation anxiety is anxiety and distress that a baby feels once he is separated from his attachment figure.
Explain what stranger anxiety is
Stranger anxiety is anxiety and distress felt by a baby, in the presence of an unfamiliar person ( stranger). They show a preference of being with the primary caregiver.
Outline all the main research methods used by scientists in attachment.
Observations: Frame by frame video analysis.
longitudinal studies.
Natural experiments, and animal studies.
explain what is meant by Frame by frame video analysis, and its strength.
When researcher record the behaviour of participants on a camera, and then make detailed observations of the behaviour observed.They check every frame of it.
STRENGTH: You can ensure you’re results are reliable.
explain what is meant by a longitudinal study.
when researchers investigate the same participants, across different periods of time, we call it a longtitudinal study.
Longitudinal studies may observe both observations, and self report techniques.
What is a strength of longitudinal studies.
- Gives the researcher a deeper insight into behaviour, and how it changes over time.
- It gives researcher insight, into how early experiences shape behaviour.
- can see if results are reliable across time, meaning that they can contain more reliable results.
What are the weaknesses of longitudinal studies?
Attrition: This is when across the study, the researcher loses some of the participants, from the sample.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of natural experiments.
Natural experiments Allow us to study independent variables, that would be unethical to investigate in a lab experiment.
However, we lack control of extraneous variables, because some past events in the lives of participants may affect our dependant variable, therefore we can’t establish a cause and effect relationship.
What are the weaknesses of animal studies?
- may not generalise to humans ( can’t extrapolate), because animals are much more different than humans.
- Ethical issues: protection from harm towards animals, and animals can’t give informed consent, because they can’t speak.
However, the benefits outweigh the negatives.
