Attachment

• Attachment

  An enduring, two-way, emotional tie to a specific person, normally between a parent and child
• Attachment is not present at birth but develops in set stages within a fairly set timescale
• How we/researchers/psychologists recognise an infant has an attachment

  1. Proximity: People try to stay physically close to those they are attached to

  2. Separation distress: People are distressed when an attachment figure leaves their presence

  3. Secure base behaviour: We always 'touch base' with our attachment figure and regularly return to their attachment figure while playing

  4. Pleasure when meeting parent/caregiver
• It is believed the early social interactions between infants and carers play an important role in the child's social development
• Caregiver-Infant interactions

  Early interactions between caregiver and infant serve to develop and maintain an attachment bond between them
• Interactional synchrony


  • Caregiver and infant respond in time to keep communication going. e.g infant smiles, caregiver smiles back at the same time. This type of communication ensures infant and caregivers emotions and actions mirror each other's. This again serves to reinforce the attachment bond
• Reciprocity


  • This is a two-way, mutual process where infant and caregiver take turns to respond to each other's behaviours/signals, to sustain interaction (like a conversation). The behaviour of each party elicits a response from the other, E.g child puts arms out to be held - caregiver picks up
• reciprocity-Babies have 'alert phases' and signal when they are ready for interaction. Mothers pick up and act on these signals 2/3rd of the time
• Brazleton: 'Both mother and baby initiate (start) the interaction and take it in turns to do so. He called this the 'dance.' He said it's like when a couple dance together they respond to each other's moves'
• Research into Caregiver infant interactions - Melzoff and Moore


  Melzoff and moore found that infants aged 2-3 weeks tended to imitate both facial and manual gestures. This supported the idea that reciprocity is a feature of care giver infant interactions as adult and babies take turn to respond to each others behaviours to sustain interaction. This supports the role of caregiver in infant developing strong attachment bonds
• Melzoff and Moore Research Procedure


  1. Controlled observations

  2. Babies exposed to 4 different stimuli

  3. 3 facial gestures (sticking tongue out)

  4. 1 manual gesture (waving fingers)

  5. Babies' responses to gestures observed

  6. Babies' actions video recorded

  7. Independent observer with no knowledge of what infant had seen noted tongue protrusion and head movements using a number of behavioural categories

  8. Observer scored videos twice allowing intra-observer and inter-rater reliability to be assessed
• Findings and Conclusions of Melzoff and Moore - care giver infant 


  Findings- Results indicated that babies aged 12 to 27 days old could imitate both facial and manual gestures.

  Conclusions- They concluded that the ability to imitate serves as an important building block for later social and cognitive development.
• Melzoff and Moore Research


  • High inter rater reliability as observers scored videos twice so results obtained are consistent
  • Koepka failed to replicate Melzoff and Moore's findings but they have counter argued this by saying this was due to lower control over the experimental conditions
  • Research has suggested that infants can't distinguish between videotaped interactions and live interactions with their mothers suggesting that infants do not directly respond to the adult themselves
  • We must be cautious of making the assumption that these explanations are universal and consider individual differences within the development of these interactions and the difficulty in studying these
• Problems testing behaviours

  • Critics argue that the research in to caregiver-infant interactions can be prone to bias, as babies cannot speak, inferences must be drawn about their behaviour. What is being observed is just hand movements or changes in expression. Thus, it is difficult to know what is taking place from the infant's perspective
  • This means that we cannot know for certain that interactions between mothers and babies have special meaning. Furthermore, infant's mouths are often in motion (sticking out tongue, yawning, smiling) consequently, it is difficult to establish between general activity and specific imitated behaviours
• Counterpoint for problem testing behaviours AO3- care giver infant However, observations of mothers and infants are generally well controlled with filming taking place from various angles


  This means that very fine can be recorded and analysed like melzoff and moore research. Furthermore babies do not know they are being filmed so do not show demand characteristics . Therefore a strength of this type of research is that it has high validity.
• Isabella and belsky AO3 Caregiver-infant pairs with insecure attachment relationships


  • Interactions are minimally involved, unresponsive and intrusive
  • Avoidant pairs show maternal intrusiveness and overstimulation
  • Resistant pairs are poorly coordinated, under involved and inconsistent. Isabella and belsky concluded that different interactional behaviours predicted attachment quality.
• Caregiver baby pairs with secure attachment relationships would show more synchronous behaviour than babies with insecure relationships . Therefore there is Supportive evidence by Isabella and Belsky for the role of interactional synchrony in developing secure attachments. Babies observed at 3 and 9 months and secure group interacted in a well timed, reciprocal and mutually rewarding manner.
• Cultural Differences - AO3 for caregiver infant.

  Interactional synchrony is not found in all cultures. This weakens support for the idea that interactional synchrony is necessary for attachment formation. Le Vine, reported that kenyan mothers have little physical contact or interactions with their infants , but such infants do have a high proportion of secure attachments. This evidence challenges the importance of interactional synchrony in development of attachment.
• Procedure of Schaffer and Emerson Study

  1. Longitudinal study on 60 working class newborn babies and their mothers from Glasgow

  2. The babies and mothers were visited at their own homes every month for the first year of the baby's life and again at 18 months

  3. Observations and interviews (with mothers) were used
• Attachment was measured in two ways - still part of procedure in schaffer and emersons study

  • Separation anxiety- assessed by the infant being left alone in a room, or the researcher asking the mother how the infant reacts in this instance
  • Stranger Anxiety-assessed by the researcher starting each home visit by approaching the infant to see if this distressed the child
• Findings of Schaffer and Emerson study

  Evidence for the different stages of attachment were found. 50% of children showed their first specific attachment between 25-32 weeks. At 6-8months half of babies showed separation anxiety towards their mother. Stranger anxiety was shown a month later. At 18 months, 87% had at least 2 attachments and 31% had 5 or more attachments. 39% of infants prime attachment was not to the main carer.
• Asocial phase- stages of attachment identified by schaffer ao1


  First few weeks, baby's behaviour towards non-human objects and humans is quite similar, but babies are happier when in the presence of other humans
• Indiscriminate attachment phase- AO1 stages of attachment identified by schaffer. From 2-7 months , babies start to display more observable social behaviour, show a preference for people over inanimate objects, and recognise and prefer familiar adults. Babies will usually accept cuddles and comfort from any adult and do not show separation/stranger anxiety
• Specific attachment phase- AO1 stages of attachment identified by Schaffer


  From around 7 months, majority of babies start to display stranger anxiety and separation anxiety when separated from one particular adult (usually the biological mother), this is a specific attachment and is not necessarily the person the child spends most time with but the one who offers the most interaction and responds to the baby's signals the most
• Multiple attachments stage- AO1 stages of attachment identified by schaffer

  after children show specific attachments, they usually extend this attachment behaviour to other adults whom they regularly spend time with. In Schaffer and Emerson’s study, 29% of children had multiple attachments within a month of forming a specific attachment. By the age of 1 year the majority of infants have developed multiple attachments. At 18 months, 75% of infants had an attachment with their father
• Stages of attachment identified by schaffer- AO3

  Attachment determined using 2 measures, separation anxiety and stranger anxiety. Some critics believe these are too limited as measures of attachment. For eg, infants in the Asocial phase are generally immobile + if they felt anxiety they may display this in more subtle, hard to observe ways. This would make it difficult for mothers to observe + report back to researchers on signs of anxiety + attachment in this age group. This is a weakness for the stages of attachment as it suggests that it is incomplete + so lacks internal validity.
• Stages of attachment- AO3 


  Asocial stage may be less asocial that Schaffer + Emerson assumed. Even very young infants typically respond to 1 special person in a unique way. This is shown in the evidence from Bushnell. She presented 2 day old babies with faces of their mother and a female stranger until they had spent a total of 20sec focusing on 1 of the faces. Almost 2/3 of babies preferred their mothers face over the stranger. This is a weakness as it appears that attachments may form at an earlier stage than Schaffer suggested
• Multiple Attachments- AO1

  John Bowlby believed that children had 1 prime attachment+ that although children had attachments to other people, these were of minor importance compared to their main attachment bond. However, Rutter proposed a model of multiple attachments that saw all attachments as of equal importance, with these attachments combining to help to form a child’s internal working model. Multiple attachments are often formed to different people for different purposes, for eg to mother for loving care, but additionally to father for exciting unpredictable play.
• Multiple Attachments AO3


  It can be argued that children with multiple attachments are at an advantage; they are more able to form and conduct social relationships, as they have the experience to do so and if a child loses an attachment figure, it has several others that it can turn to.
• Multiple Attachment AO3

  Evidence to support multiple attachments comes from Schaffer and Emerson who carried put a longitudinal study of 60 infants. They found that most infants went on to develop multiple attachments. At 18 months, 87% had at least 2 attachments with 31% having 5 or more attachments. Attachments to different people were of a similar nature, with infants behaving in the same way to diff attachment figures.
• Multiple Attachments AO3

  Carpenter presented infants with familiar and unfamiliar voices and faces. He found that two week old babies looked at a face longest when it was the mother’s accompanied by her voice and were distressed by the sight of her face accompanied by a different voice. This suggests that babies can recognise and are attracted to their mothers from an early age contradicting Schaffer and Emerson‘s belief that initially babies were attracted to any person interacting with them.
• The role of the father- AO1

  Factors been identified that affect the relationship between fathers and children: Degree of sensitivity- more secure attachments to their children are found in fathers who show more sensitivity to children’s needs. Type of attachment with own parents- single parent fathers tend to form similar attachments with their children that they had with their own parents.
• The role of the father - AO1

  Marital Intimacy- the degree of intimacy a father has within his relationship with his partner affects the type of attachment he will have with his children. Supportive co parenting- the amount of support a father gives to his partner in helping to care for children affects the type of attachment he will have with his children.
• Research into the role of the father

  Geiger found that father play interactions were more exciting in comparison to mothers. However, mothers play interactions were more affectionate and nurturing. This suggests that the role of the father is in fact as a playmate and not as a sensitive parent who responds to the needs of their children, these results also confirm that the mother takes on a more nurturing role.
• Research into the role of the father

  Grossman found that quality of infants attachment with their mothers, but not their fathers was related to the children’s attachment in adolescence. Grossman suggests fathers have a different role in attachment- one that is more to do with play and stimulation, and less to do with nurturing, but is still important for the child’s wellbieng.
• Research into the role of the father

  Hardy reported that fathers are less able than mothers to detect low levels of infant distress. These results appear to support the biological explanations that the lack of oestrogen in men means that fathers are not quipped, biologically to form close attachments with their children. However, this to some extent suggests that the role of the father is biologically determined and that the father’s role is restricted due to his biological makeup.
• Contradictory research into the role of the father

  Lamb found that fathers who become main care providers seem able to quickly develop more sensitivity to childrens needs and become a safe base from which to explore, which suggests sensitive responsiveness isn’t a biological ability limited to women.
• Contradictory research into the role of the father

  Belsky found that high levels of marital intimacy were related to secure father- infant attachments, and that low levels of marital intimacy was related to insecure father- child attachments. This supports the idea that the closeness of relationships between fathers and partners affects the type of attachment a father has with his children.
• Further AO3 of role of the father

  Children with secure attachments to their fathers go on to have better relationships with peers, less problem behaviours and can regulate their emotions; illustrating the positive influence fathers can have on developmental outcomes
• Further AO3 on role of the father

  Children who grow up without fathers have often been seen to do less well at school and have higher levels of risk taking and aggression, especially in boys. This suggests fathers can help prevent negative developmental outcomes.