Cultural variations

• Kroonenberg et als research into types of attachment around the world, this is known as a meta analysis. This replicated the strange situation experiment in a variation of countries such as Germany, Japan and Israel. The results show there was a wide variation of results. Most children in Germany (individualist culture) were insecure resistant as the parents preferred the kids to be independent. While in Japan (collectivist culture) they were insecure avoidant.
• A strength of this research is that the studies were conducted by the indigenous psychologist. Takahashi carried out the strange situation in Japan and found that 32% were type c and 60% were type a. This means the risk of cross cultural research is low, such as language barriers or misunderstandings. This can lead to stereotyping and makes the research have less validity
• A limitation of the study is that the samples are unrepresentative of the culture. The meta-analysis only shows the difference between countries not cultures, as there are many sub-cultures within a country with different child rearing practices. For example Takahashi only looked at a sample from 60 middle class infants which could have different ways then the working class families. Furthermore, Environmental factors may differ between studies making the results unreliable.
• Another limitation is that the method of assessment is biased. The strange situation was designed by an American psychologist based off a British theory. This leads to imposed etic which is trying to apply a theory designed for one culture to another culture. For example during the "reunion" stage German infants behaviour was more independent because of the parenting there compared to America which had a more welcoming reunion. This means the study may lack validity.