9. Influence of early attachment on later relationships

• Internal working model


  - Acts as a template/ example for all later relationships according to john Bowlby.

  - This template with powerfully affect the way you behave and the nature of all the future formations you go on to form.
• insecure-avoidant attachment in later relationships


  They will seek out relations they feel comfortable in but try to stay uninvolved and attempt to stay as far away mentally as possible.
• Secure attachment attachment in later relationships

  They will go on to for 'normal relationships' based upon the unconditional love they received from their parents.
• insecure-resistant attachment in later relationships


  They may be controlling and argumentized because that is likely what they observed in their relationships.
• Bad relationships in childhood


  They will bring those bad experiences into the relationships they go on to make with friends and family.
• Internal working model affects

  our romantic relationships and out parental relationships with our own children.
• Myron-Wilson and Smith (1989)

  investigated attachment type and bullying. They sent a standard questionnaire out to children aged 7 - 11 years in London.
• Myron-Wilson and Smith (1989) findings

  - Secure - unlikely to be involved

  - Insecure-resistant - most likely to be the bullies

  - Insecure-avoidant - most likely to be the victims
• Kerns (1994)


  Securely attached children are more likely to go and form the best quality childhood friendships whereas insecurely attachment will have more of a difficulty to for friendships
• Mccarthy (1999)


  studied 40 adult women who were assessed as babies to establish their early attachment type
• Mccarthy (1999) findings


  - Securely attached babies had the best adult friendships and romantic experiences

  - Insecure-resistant adults had particular problems maintaining friendships

  - Insure- avoidant adults struggled with intimacy in in romantic relationships
• Hazan and Shaver (1987)


  A classical study of the association between attachment and later adult relationships.
• Hazan and Shaver (1987) procedure

  They analysed 620 replies to a love quiz that was printed in an American newspaper.

  It has three sections. That assessed current relationships, general romantic experiences and attachment type
• Hazan and Shaver (1987) findings

  56% identified as securely attached, 25%as insecure-avoidant and 19% as insecure-resistant

  Securely attachment formed long lasting romantic relationships

  Avoidant seemed to revealed jealousy and fear of intimacy
• Hazan and Shaver (1987) findings suggest

  that attachment patterns are associated with romantic experiences.
• Bailey et al (2007)


  They considered the attachment type of 99 mothers to their mothers as well as their own babies
• Bailey et al (2007) procedure


  Mother-baby attachment was assessed using strange situation and attachments to their own mothers were assessed using adult attachment interviews.
• Bailey et al (2007) findings


  Majority of women had the same attachment classification as their own mothers
• Research support


  -There are studies that link attachment to later life.

  E.G., Fearson and Roisman (2017) concluded that early attachment consistently predicts later attachment as well as emotional-wellbeing

  - The strength of the link between the early attachment type and later development depends on your attachment type as well as the aspect of your later life.

  - While insecure avoidant attachment types show mild connection between the two we can see that will children who have had disorganized attachments they are likely to suffer from mental health issues in the future

  - Meaning that secure attachments show major advantages in later development
• Counterpoint - not all research is supportive


  Not all evidence supports this link

  Becker-slot et al - followed 43 individuals from the age of 1. At age 16 adult attachment interviews were conducted and there had been no evidence of continuity

  This suggests that the extent to which the tow influence each other is unknown. Meaning hter may other facts that there may be more important factors.
• Validity issues with retrospective studies

  - One limitation is that early attachment is measured retrospectively

  - A lot of the research is not done using longitudinal studies they don't asses the attachment in early life and then go back to see how it tracked through their early life.

  - They likely conduct interviews asking participants questions about their early life

  - This means that research conducted into early attachment may be confounded by other variables making them inaccurate and meaningless.
• What makes adult attachment interviews unreliable?

  - Asking these questions relies on complete honesty and recollection of past experiences

  - It can be hard to tell whether what is being assessed is early attachment or adult attachments
• Confounding varibles


  - A further limitation would be the existence of confounding variables.

  - Some studies do assess attachment in early life (like McCarthy). However, some of those studies re affected by confounding variables.

  - This is because different parenting styles can affect later development as well as the quality of attachment and genetic personality trait and affect both.

  - This means we can never be sure that early attachment is what's influencing our later lives as it could be other factors