Cultural Variations in attachment

• What was the aim of van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg's research?

  To study the proportions of the three attachment types across a range of countries to assess cultural variation
• Describe the procedure of Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg's research:

  • Meta analysis of 32 studies where the strange situation had been used
  • Conducted in eight countries
  • 15 were in the US
  • Overall 1990 children were studied
• Describe the findings of Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg's research:

  • Wide variation between the proportions of attachment types in different studies
  • In every country secure attachment was most common
  • Proportion varied from 75% in Britain and 50% in China
  • In individualist cultures rate of insecure resistant attachment was similar to Ainsworth's study (under 14%)
  • In collectivist samples from Japan, China and Israel rate of insecure resistant was above 25% (rates of insecure avoidant reduced)
• Describe Simonelli et al research into attachment:

  • 76 babies aged 12-Month old using the Strange Situation to see whether the proportion of attachment types matched types from previous studies
• Describe the procedure of Simonelli et al study:

  • Mothers were reasonably varied in terms of their education levels 
• Describe the findings of Simonelli et al study:

  • 50% were secure, 36% insecure-avoidant. This is a lower rate of secure attachment than found in previous studies.
• Describe the conclusions of Simonelli et al study:

  • The researchers suggested that was due to the increasing numbers of mother’s working long hours and using professional childcare. Cultural changes can make dramatic differences in the patterns of attachment      
• Describe Mi Kyong Jinn et al study:

  • The Strange Situation was used to assess 87 babies.
  • Overall proportions of insecure and secure babies were similar to those in most countries with most babies being  secure.
  • However more of those who were classed as insecurely attached were resistant and only one baby was avoidant. This is similar to the findings in Japan by Van Ijzendoorn.

  Japan and Korea are said to have similar child-rearing styles and so this similarity could be explained in terms of child rearing
• Strength - Indigenous research:

  • Most of the studies were carried out by indigenous psychologists
  • Problems in cross cultural research can be avoided
  • Avoids bias and stereotypes from other countries
  • Increasing validity
• Limitation - Confounding Variables:

  • Studies conducted in different countries are not usually matched for methodology when compared in meta analysis
  • Sample characteristics such as poverty social class, and age can confound results
  • Additionally, environmental factors such as size and layout of the room can change how we observe the babies
• Limitation - Imposed etic:

  • The imposition of a test designed for one culture onto another
  • imposed etic occur when we assume an idea or technique that works in one culture will work in another
• Limitation - More variations within countries:

  • Variations between results of studies within the same country were actually 150% greater than those between countries
  • e.g. in US one study found 46% securely attached compared to one sample as high as 90%