stages of attachement

• 1. asocial attachment (2 months)


  responses to objects, establishes child's relationship with others
• 2. indiscriminate attachment (2-7 months)


  child shows preference for people, can recognise and prefer familiar adults
• 3. specific attachment (7 months+)

  infants show separation and stranger anxiety, looks to particular people for security, comfort and protection.
• 4. multiple attachments 


  attachment behaviours displayed towards other people - secondary attachments
• Schaffer & Emerson (1964) studied 60 babies from Glasgow at monthly intervals for the first 18 months of life
• schaffer & emerson found 50% of babies aged 25 -35 weeks showed signs of separation and anxiety towards mum - specific attachment
• attachments tended to be formed with caregiver who was interactive and sensitive to baby's signals
• separation anxiety


  infant becomes distressed after being separated from caregiver
• stranger anxiety


  infant shows distress in the presence of unknown people
• X culturally biased - only conducted in glasgow (ethnocentric)
• ✔️ high ecological validity - experiments carried out in home
• X parents recorded behaviour in diaries - subjective results
• X low population validity- infants in the study all came from Glasgow and were mostly from w/c families.
• X unreliable - risk of demand characteristics and social desirability from parents
• X lacks temporal validity - conducted in the 1960s when gender roles were different