Attachment

• Meltzoff and Moore

  Found as young as 2-3 weeks infants imitated hand/facial gestures. The study was a primary caregiver displaying 3 facial and hand gestures. A dummy was placed in the infant's mouth to prevent any initial response. After, the dummy was removed and child's expression was filmed. It was a double blind test so observers didn't know the aim. Found a positive correlation between infant's actions and those of primary caregiver.
• Tronick- The still face experiment 


  Procedure: Caregiver instructed to stop interacting with their child. Simply just stare at them

  Found: Caused distress from infant. Infant expect reciprocity.
• Evaluation of caregiver- infant interaction: Strengths

  + Most of the observations are controlled. Use of behavioural checklists and inter observer reliability. Also no demand characteristics as an actual aim is not explained just observations.

  +Valuable- infants acquire understanding of what others think and feel (TOM) . Important in conductiong social relationships
• Evaluations of care giver interactions: limitation

  -Lacks repeatability: Koepke et al failed to replicate Moore and Meltzoff findings

  -Suggestion of a cause and effect: Isabella et al found more strongly attached infant- caregivers showed greater interactional synchrony. The relationship between closeness of synchrony and strength of attachment explain individual differences.
• Schaffer and Emerson

  60 babies from Glasgow studies. Visited their home once a month for a year and again when the babies were 18 months. Passed through Schaffer 4 stages of attachment. Found by 40 weeks 80% had discriminate attachment and 30 % had multiple attachment. Attachments likely to form with carer if they are sensitive to baby's signals rather than the amount of time they spend with the.
• Evaluation of Schaffer's stages of attachment: based on Glasgow study 


  + high ecological validity: natural setting

  -lacks temporal validity: in a time for stay at home mothers

  -low internal validity: Asked mothers to record infant behaviour through observations as there perspective. Social desirability bias

  -low generalisability: unrepresented sample, same city and same social class

  -Cultural differences: Collectivist cultures view multiple attachment as the norm from the outset (Van Ijzendoorn et al)
• Role of the father 


  Field studies face to face interactions on film of 4 month olds. Found fathers that were the primary caregiver acted the same as the mother who was the primary caregiver. Shows level of responsiveness is key to attachment no gender of the parent
• Role of the father

  • Adopt a play mate role
  • distinctions between primary and secondary caregivers important for fathers
  • Research has neglected father roles
  • Schaffer and Emerson found 75% infants formed attachment with there fathers at 18 months.
• Evaluation for role of the father

  + Practical implications: support for the role of the father, pushes the importance of paternity pay increase. Also, fathers becoming an a active role with their children decreasing the amount of people going to therapy for "daddy issues".

  -Biological arguement: Oestrogen is a female hormone that has high levels of nurturing associated with it. Argues men don't have enough. Bowlby argues that fathers are key for economical functions
• Evaluation for role of the father

  +Real world applications that the role of the father is as important as the mother: same sex parents and single fathers according to MacCallum et al

  -Economical and social implications: if mothers are so much more important. There will be an increase in maternity pay which the government and businesses will have to pay. This means there may be difficulty in getting a job for women, as they don't want to pay that cost.
• Evaluation of animal studies

  -Harlow's study influenced by confounding variable. The towelling mother had more of an attractive face. May have affected the dependent variable not food or comfort.

  -inconsistent findings with Lorenz. Guiton et al found that when his chicks were sexual imprinted to yellow rubber gloves they were able to be reversed. Guiton allowed chicken to relate with each other after imprinting which Lorenz did not do
• Evaluation of animal studies

  -lack generalisability. Humans are much more complex than animals since we have the ability of free will. For example, doctors and nurses are the first person babies see yet imprinting doesn't occur.

  -Ethical concerns with Harlow study. Monkey's could have reacted due to fear (flight or fight) rather than preference since they suffered emotionally, even affecting their future attachment relationships.

  + High explanatory power for understanding attachment
• Learning theory: Classical conditioning 


  Classical conditioning: attachment formed through association of of food and caregiver. The food is UCS, pleasure UCR. NS is the caregiver e.g mother. NS AND UCS consistently associated with each other becoming CS producing CR, pleasure (mother love).
• Learning theory: Operant conditioning 


  Operant conditioning: Based on operant conditioning and drive reduction theory. Hungry infants drive to reduce the discomfort and this is done by feeding them. Pleasure is felt from feeding which is a postive reinforcement. Food becomes the primary reinforcer since it supplies the reward and the mother becomes the secondary reinforcer since they are the source of reward.
• Evaluation of learning theory

  + Explanatory power: holds value as it is seen in real life that infants do form attachment through association and reinforcement .

  -Food is not key to formation of attachment: Harlow study
• Evaluation of learning theory

  -methodological issues: supporting research is from Pavlov and Skinner. Used rats and dogs, lack generalisability. Both were experiments meaning controlled, lacks ecological validity.

  -environmental reductionist: Attachment is more complex than a stimulus response association and there are other explanations such as evolutionary innate attachment (Bowlby's monotropic theory)
• Bowlby's monotropic theory 


  Proposed an evolutionary explanation, where attachment is an innate system. Gives survival advantage as infants are protected by caregiver.
• Bowlby's monotropic theory

  1. Monotropy- theory described as monotropic as it places importance of 1 particular caregiver ( usually mother). Law of continuity explains the more constant and predictable a child's care is, the better quality of attachment. Emotionally and socially competent in adult and child hood.
• Bowlby's monotropic theory

  2. Social releasers: babies being born with innate cute behaviours. Encourage attention from adults. Activates the adult attachment system. Make them feel love towards the infant. Triggers innate predisposition to become attached.
• Bowlby's monotropic theory

  3. Critical period: Attachment has to be formed within the 2 years or won't be formed. Most active within first 6 months
• Bowlby's monotropic theory 


  4. Internal working model: A mental representation of attachment with caregiver, that is used as the blueprint for future relationships. Affects the ability to parent.
• Evaluation of Bowlby's monotropic theory 


  +research support from Hazen and Shaver for internal working model. Used a self report questionnaire called the Love Quiz. Found positive correlation between early attachment types and later adult relationships.

  -lacks cultural relativism: Marlowe et al found tribe in Tanzania shared childcare. Goes against monotropy yet they still had healthy relationships.
• Evaluation for Bowlby's monotropic theory

  +Research support for social releasers: Tronick. Demonstrated them but caregiver told not to interact caused distress for infants.

  -other explanations for monotropy. genetic differences with anxiety and social ability to why attachment may be hard for some
• Ainsworth's Strange Situation Procedure

  • 100 middle class American infants
  • controlled observation
  • novel environment
  • 8 stages e.g. parents sit and infant plays, stranger left alone with infants, parent returns and offers comfort.
  • enable observations of infant's response: separation anxiety, stranger anxiety, reunion behaviour, willingness to explore, parent as secure base
• Ainsworth's Strange Situation findings

  • Secure attachment: 66%. willingness to explore high, stranger anxiety moderate, separation anxiety-easy to soothe, enthusiastic when caregiver returns
  • Insecure avoidant attachment: 22%. High willingness to explore. Stranger and separation anxiety, low and indifferent. Avoid contact when be reuniting with caregiver.
  • Insecure resistant attachment: 12% low willingness to explore. High stranger anxiety. Distressed for separation anxiety. Seeks and rejects for reunion with parent.
• Evaluation for Strange Situations

  +practical applications. Circle of security project. Helps caregivers to understand signals of distress and feeling of anxiety for their infants. Also, helped child's life socially for future relationship

  -Ethnocentric: American infant caregiver used. Socially incentive, low populational validity and culturally bias.
• Cultural variations in attachment

  Key study: Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg. A meta analysis of 32 studies of attachment across 8 countries.

  Found:

  US used as the baseline to compare too. 65% secure.

  Germany large number of insecure avoidant 35%. may be because they brought up to be independent.

  Japan had a large number of insecure resistant 27%. may be because rarely ways from their parents
• Evaluation for cultural variation

  -meta analysis compared nations not cultures: Each country has multiple cultures within it, that have different childcare practices. Study in Tokyo were urban setting had similar attachment to western studies while rural setting were insecure-resistant.

  -unrepresentative sample: multiple trials need to be had for all the countries to ensure reliability. 2 in Japan and 3 in Germany.
• Evaluation for cultural variation

  -ethnocentric: US as the baseline. differences in childrearing techniques. imposed ethics as other cultures are wrongfully judged

  -limited amount of countries: from westernised and western cultures. No African countries mentioned. lacks holistic and populational validity
• Evaluation for Strange Situations

  +high predictive validity: Measures something real and valuable for future development. Secure generally have a better outcome, Hazen and Shaver

  -alternative attachment: Temperament Hypothesis blames the baby. some babies are just different due to genetic differences like anxiety or social ability.
• Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation

  Hypothesis: warm and continual presence of care from a mother or suitable caregiver is needed for healthy psychological/ emotional development
• Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation

  Focused on deprivation= loss of emotional care usually provided by a primary caregiver.

  Separation is the cause of deprivation. Separation is not being in the presence of the primary attachment figure

  Critical period=sustained deprivation is most damaging in the first 2.5 years. Continuing risk up to the age of 5.
• Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation 


  Effects on development:

  • Intellectual Development=Maternally deprived children can experince delayed intellectual development. Goldfarb found lower IQ in children in institution than those who were fostered
  • Emotional Development= Affectionless psychopathy- the inability to feel guilty or strong emotion towards others. Prevents normal relationships an leads to criminality.
• Evaluation for Bowlby's maternal deprivation theory

  -not clear distinction between privation and deprivation. Had they original had that attachment or not is unclear.

  -methodological issues with 44 Thieves: collected data by self report methods, which is retrospective. Unreliable and lacks internal validity due to social desirability bias.
• Evaluation for Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation

  +Positive real world application. Before his research children were separated from parents when they spent time in hospitals, visiting hours were discouraged or forbidden. So his theory led to a major social change in the way children are cared in hospitals. Can limit delayed emotional and intellectual development that could cause more hospital hours.

  -Negative real world application. Influenced the Uk government's decision not to offer free childcare places unlike other European countries.
• Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation

  Key study: 44 juvenile thieves

  44 thieves were compared with 44 non thieves from a delinquency centre. Bowlby collected data via interviews and questionnaires. Found: Almost none of the control participants experienced early separation whereas 39%of all the thieves had
• Romanian Orphan Studies

  165 Romanian children spent early lives in Romanian institutions. 111 adopted at age 2 and 54 adopted at age 4. Adoptees were tested at age 4,6,11,15 to assess physical, emotional and cognitive development. Data was gathered from interviews by parents and teachers and was compared with a control group of British children adopted in UK before 6 months.
• Romanian Orphan studies findings

  Romanian orphans lagged behind British orphans on physical, cognitive, emotional development as they were smaller, weighted less and mentally ill. For 6 months they were able to catch up to the British orphans. Age 4 some had caught up.

  Follow up: beyond 6 months showed disinhibited attachment and problems with peer relationships
• Effects of Institutionalisation

  • Physical Underdevelopment: Physically smaller. Emotional care rather than poor nourishment is the cause which has been called deprivation dwarfism
  • Intellectual under functioning: cognitive development affected by emotional deprivation
  • Disinhibited Attachment: disorganised attachment. Children don't discriminate between who they choose as attachment figures and may be overly friendly to strangers and seek attention.
  • Poor parenting: Quinton et al found that women who experienced institutionalisation found it difficult to parent in their 20s.
• Evaluation of Romanian Orphan studies: effects of institutionalisation

  +Positive real world application: importance of early adoption. Most babies are adopted within first week of birth. Singer et al showed early adopted mothers and children just as secure as non adoptive families

  +It is a longitudinal study: Able to show the effects for a sufficient time. Making the findings more reliable. HOWEVER, longitudinal studies can easily be influenced by extraneous variables