The development of attachment

• The first stage of attachment is the asocial stage, which happens at 0-6 weeks, and Is when young infants are asocial in that many kinds of stimuli, both social and non social produce a favourable reaction, like a smile
• The second stage of attachment is the indiscriminate attachment stage, which happens at 6 weeks - 7 months, which is when infants indiscriminately enjoy human company. They get upset when an individual ceases to interact with them. From 3 months, they’ll smile more at familiar faces and confronted easily to be a regular caregiver
• The third stage of attachment is the specific attachment and the first true attachment, which happens at 7 months - 9 months, which is when infants express protect when separated from in particular individual and attempt to stay close to the person and show wariness of strangers
• The final stage of attachment is the multiple attachment stage, which happens at 10 months and onwards, which is when children begin to attach to others. By 18 months the majority of infants have formed multiple attachments
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964) conducted a natural observation and longitudinal study. The sample contained 60 infants aged 5-23 weeks and were observed every four weeks until they turned 1 and then observed again at 18 months of age
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964) concluded that attachment can be measured in two ways:

  1. Separation protest
  2. Stranger anxiety
• Separation protest and stranger anxiety are both signs that an attachment has been formed
• Schaffer and Emerson (1964) found that 1/2 the infants showed their first specific attachment between the age of 6-8 months. Stranger anxiety occurred in all infants around one month after this time. The intensity of attachment peaked after one month after attachment behaviour first appeared, as assessed by separation protest
• However, intensely attached infants had mothers who responded quickly to their demands and interacted with their children. Infants who were weakly attached had mothers who failed to interact
• it can be concluded from the study that infants for the strongest attachment with adults who respond more accurately to their behaviour. Adults who showed this quality were said to exhibit sensitive responsiveness and this appeared to be the key to attachment
• A strength of the study is the use of naturalistic observation which were carried out in the families own homes and most of the observation was done by the child’s parents during ordinary activities
• The behaviour of babies was unlikely to be affected by the presence of observers. this has the advantage of ensuring the infants behaved naturally whilst being observed, and therefore gives the study high external validity
• A weakness of the research is the fact that all the families involved were from Glasgow and were in the same social class, which means there may be a lack of population validity
• Childrearing practises differ from one culture to another, from one class to another and from one historical period to another. Therefore, the results don’t generalise well to other social and historical contexts due to their lack of external validity