Attachment

• Alert phase : a phase where babies signal when they are ready to interact with their caregiver
• Interactional synchrony :child and caregiver synchronise their behaviour to each other the child may move their body to the rat gum if the caregiver voice
• Meltzof and Moore(1977): interaction synchrony observed as young as two weeks old, adult asksed to display 3 facials expressions. Association made between the expressions and the action of the child
• High synchrony = higher attachment - synchrony provides foundation for mother and child connection that can be built on
• Isabella et al (1989)- observed 20 mothers and infants assessed the degree of synchrony and quality of attachment - high levels of synchrony associated with good quality mothers
• Babies are now seen as active roles as they initiate interactions and take turns doing so
• Limitation of reciprocity and Interactional synchrony: it’s difficult to be sure that the infant is actually imitating the caregiver based on observations so we cannot be sure that mother-infant interactions have any special meaning
• Strength of reciprocity and Interactional synchrony: reaserchers use well controlled procedures they often film the interactions from many differnt angles which can be any listed later on. Babies also don’t know they are being recorded so their behaviour doesnt change which means the study has good validity
• Feldman(2012)-found that synchrony doesn’t describe behaviours that occur at the same time. Observing these is not useful and Disney tell us it’s purpose. However synchrony and reciptocity are helpful in the development of mother infant attachment, stress, empathy, language and moral development
• primary attachment is the first attachment that occurs between a baby and a caregiver usually the mother
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964): majority if mothers became primary caregiver around 7 months (only 3% of cases the father was and 27% of cases where the mother and father were joint) then a few weeks or months later secondary attachments where formed
• 75% of of infants formed a secondary attachment to their fathers by 18 months indicated by the child protesting when the father walked away
• Grossman(2002)” carried out a longitudinal study looking at parents behaviour and quality of attachment to their teens- found quality of attachment to fathers were less important - may indicate that fathers are less important in long term emotional development
• Fathers role is playful fathers have different role than mothers it’s more playful and less nurturing
• Field (1978)-filmed 4 month old babies whos fathers where their primary caregivers spent more time smiling, imitating and holding infants than the fathers who were secondary caregivers
• Teh key to attachment is the level of responsiveness rather than the gender
• Limitation of the role of the father- evidence undermines the idea of fathers having distinct roles. Fathers simply don’t feel they should be acting in a nurturing way or it could be due to the woman’s hormones creating higher levels of nurturing behaviourand therefore women are predisposed to be primary attachment
• strength of the role of the father- is the important economical implications mothers feel pressured to stay home because mothers are vital to healthy emotional development this give mothers comfort who feel they have to make the hard choice in returning to wokr
• Asocial stage (1st few weeks)- behaviour towards people and objects are similar Some prefrance for familiar adults - happier in presence I’d other humans
• Indiscriminate attachment(2-7 months)- display more observable social behaviour with a prefrance for people rather than objects, recognise familiar adults don’t show stranger or separation anxiety
• Specific attachment(7 months) stranger and sepatration anxiety when separated from one particular adult baby. form specific attachment, someone who offers the most interactions and responds to the babies signals (65% of mothers)
• Multiple attachments (1 year )-secondary attachments happen shortly after
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964):

  prodecdure- 60 babies and mothers from Glasgow working class. Researcher visited their home every month for a year from 18 months

  separation and stranger anxiety measured by asking mothers questions

  findings- 50% of babies showed separation anxiety towards a particular adult between 25 and 32 weeks.

  conclusions-most interactive and sensitive to infant signals and facial expressions was more likely to be the primary caregiver
• Strengths of Schaffer and Emerson’s study- high external validity as babies were unlikely to be affected by the presence of observers participant behaved naturally.

  longitudinal better internal validity do not have confounding variables of individual participants
• Limitation of schaffer and Emerson study -problem with how multiple attachment is assessed just because a child gets distressed when someone leave the room doesn’t mean that they are attached (bowlby pointed that children may be distressed when a play mate leaves the room signifying that they are not attached ) view of stages does not distinguish behaviour between primary and secondary attachment
• Lorenz (1952)- 12 goose eggs split into two groups. The controll group the goslings hatched in their natural environment seeing their mother and the other half were hatched in an incubator and saw Lorenz. he then mixed all the goslings together he the control group followed their mother and the other group followed him.

  he identified a critical period where imprinting had to occur or no attachments would be made.
• The study found that the monkeys preferred the cloth mother regardless of which one produced milk, suggesting that contact comfort is more important than food.
• As adults, the monkeys had been deprived of their mothers, making them more aggressive, less sociable, and less skilled, and sometimes resulted in them neglecting or killing their own offspring.
• Harlow (1958) conducted a study with 16 monkeys and two wired model mothers, one who did not produce milk and another who was covered in cloth, to determine the importance of contact comfort over food.
• When frightened, the monkeys also went to the cloth mother.
• Limitation of lorenz study- was not generalisable as birds and human are very different and mammalian mother and their children had more emotional attachments
• Strength of Lorenz study-support for imprinting the imprinting suggests that young animals are born with and innate mechanism to to imprint in the critical period
• Limitation of harlows study- unethical as the monkeys were not given the opportunity to develop a social bond with the mother suffered like humans and Harlow was aware of this
• Strengths of Harlows study-important practical applications it’s helped social workers undertand at risk factors in child abusers and importance of attachments in breeding in zoos