Psych attachment

• Explain reciprocity as a caregiver-infant interaction

  -from birht, babies and mothers spend lots of time inintenseand highlypleasurableinteraction, reciprocity when each personrespondsto the other,elictinga reponse from them.ALERT PHASES:babies use these tosignalthat they are ready for aspell of interaction-research shows motheres typicallypick up onandrespondto their babies alertness2/3of the time(Feldman and Eidelman)but varies according to skill and external factorsACTIVE ENVIRONMENT:babies play anactive role. both caregiver and baby caninitiateinteraction and take turns doing so. described as a dancer byBrazelton
• Explain interactional synchrony as a caregiver-infant interaction


  -takes place when caregiver and baby interact so that their actions and emotions mirror the otherSYNCHRONY BEGINS:Meltzoff and Mooreobserved the beginnings of IS in babies from 2 weeks old-an adult displayed1 of 3facial expressions of distinctive gestures. babies response wasfilmed and labelled-babies expressions and gestures were more likely tomirrorthose of theadultmore than chance would predict;significant associationIMPORTANCE FOR ATTATCHMENT:Isabella et alobserved30 mothers and babiestogether and assessed degree of synchrony. and thequality of mother-babyattachment-high levels of synchrony were linked with better quality of mother baby attachment
• Evaluate caregiver-infant interactions


  STRENGTH:research is usually filmed in alaboratory-so it is highlycontrolled, using films means that observations can be recorded andanalysed laterso researchers are less likely to misskey behaviours-more than one observercan record the data and establishinter observer reliability-babies weren’t aware they were being observed, so behaviour does not change (covert)-good reliability and validityLIMITATION:difficult tointerpret a babies behaviour-young babies lack co ordination and can be immobile, so movements being observed aresmall hand movementsorsubtle changes in expressionit is difficult to be sure what they mean and what made it happenLIMITATION:just observing behaviour does not tell us itsdevelopment importance-Feldmansaid ideas like synchrony simply givenames to patternsof behaviours, may not beusefulin understanding development as itdoesnttell us thepurpose of behavioursHOWEVER:there is research such asIsabella et alwho shows that synchrony predicted development of good quality attachment
• Name the 4 stages of attachment

  Asocial, indiscriminate, specific, multiple
• who conducted the research into the 4 stages of attachment?

  Schaffer and Emerson
• describe the 4 stages of attachment

  1)Asocial stage-first few weeksof babies life, behaviour towards human and non humansfairly similar,but even at this stage, babies show signs that theyprefer to be with people, and a preference for thepresence of familiar peopleand prefer to be comforted by them.

  2)Indiscriminate attachment-2 to 7 monthsbabies start to display moreobvious and observablesocial behaviours, showing aclear preferencefor humans> inanimate. theyrecogniseandpreferpresence of familiar people. however usually accept cuddles and comfort fromany person.do not usually show separation ancietyorstranger anxiety

  3)specific attachment- from7 months+babies start to display classic signs of attachment towardsone particular personincludinganxietytowards strangers especially when their attachment figure is absent and separation. at this point, formed specific attachment toprimary attachment figurewho offers themost interactionand responds to signals the most. this is the baby’s mother,65%

  4)multiple attachment- babies start to showattachment behaviourtowardsmultiple people- which aresecondary attachments. Schaffer and Emerson found29%of children formed secondary within a month of forming primary
• what was Schaffer and Emersons research?

  PROCEDURE:study involved60 babies,31male and29female, all fromGlasgowand majorityworking class. they visited babies and mothers in their homesevery month for first yearthen again at 18 months. they asked the mothers questions about the kinds ofprotesttheir babies showed in7 everyday situationto measure babies attachment. they also assessedstranger anxietyFINDINGS:the 4 stages of attachments
• Evaluate Schaffer and Emerson's research and stages of attachment

  STRENGTH:goodexternal validity. most of observations were made by parents duringordinary activitiesand reported to researchers, recording the babies might have distracted them or made them anxious.HOWEVER:mothers as observers are unlikely to beobjective observers, they might have beenbiasedin terms of what they noticed/reported.

  LIMITATION:validityof the measures they used toassessattachment in theasocial stage. young babies have poor coordination and fairly immobile,anxietywould have been difficult to notice so it was hard for mothers toobserve and report back signs of anxiety and attachment for this age

  STRENGTH:practical application in daycarein the asocial and indiscriminate stages daycare is likely to be straight forward, however may be problematic during specific attachment stage. so parents use of daycare can be planned using the stages
• describe attachment to the father


  -evidence suggests that fathers are muchless likelyto be babiesfirst attachment figurecompared tomothers-Schaffer and Emersonfound that majority of babies first become attached to their mothers, at 7 months, in3%of cases the father was their first sole of attachment, in27%of cases the father was joint with the mother,-however they also show that most fathers go on to become important attachments figures to babies,75%of babies formed an attachment with their at aged18 monthsd
• describe the distinctive role for fathers

  -Grossmanncarried out alongitudinalstudy where babies attachment were studiesuntil they were teens. he looked atboth parentsbehaviour and its relationship to the quality of their babies laterattachement to people-quality of baby’s attachment withmothers but not fatherswas related to attachments inadolescencesuggesting that fathers attachments were less important-however, he found that thequalityof fathers play with babies was related toquality of adolescent attachments suggestingthat fathers have a different role to mothers more to fo with play and stimulation
• fathers primary attachments figures

  -Tiffany Fieldfilmed4 month old babiesin face to face interaction with primary caregiver mothers, secondary caregiver fathers and primary caregiver fathers.-primary caregiver fathers and mothers spent more timesmiling, imitating and holding than secondary caregiver fathers whichis all part of synchrony and reciprocity.-so fathers have thepotentialto be the moreemotional focusedprimary attachment figure but perhaps only express this when given the role of primary caregiver
• Evaluate the role of the father in attachment


  LIMITATION:lack of clarity into the question being asked. “what is the role of the father”, means some researchers want to learn about their role as secondary caregivers but others as primary-makes it difficult to offer a simple answer

  LIMITATION:findings vary according to the methodology used.-longitudinalstudies (grossmann) have suggested that fathers as secondary figured have important role in development, however if fathers did have this distinct role we would expect that children growing up insingle parent or lesbian householdswould turn out different than those with heterosexual families.-studies (McCallum and Golombok)consistently show that children do not develop differentlyHOWEVER:these lines of researchmay not be in conflict, it could be that fathers typically take on distinctive roles in heterosexual families but in single parent or lesbian families., familiesadapt to take on role of father

  STRENGTH:it can be used tooffer adviceto parents, there can be confusion over who should take on the primary caregiver role,mothers may feel pressured to stay at homeor fathers may bepressured to focus on workbut this may not be economically the best solution, this research can be reassuring advice that fathers are capable of taking onprimary attachment figureand lesbian/single parent can be informed that not having a father doesn’t affect child’s development.
• explain Lorenz's research


  -discoveredimprintingwhen he was a child and a newly hatched duckfollowed him aroundprocedure:-classic experiment-1/2of goose eggs were hatched withmothergoose in theirnaturalenvironment-1/2hatched in anincubatorand first moving object they saw wasLorenzfindings:-incubator groupfollowed Lorenz around everywhere compared tocontrol group(mother) who followed themother goose-when the two groups were mixed together, they continued to follow the original person-this is imprinting; whereby birdsattach toandfollowthefirst moving object they see-critical periodwhen imprinting needs to take place, if imprinting does not occur within that time, chicks do not attach themselves to a mother figure
• evaluate Lorenz's research


  STRENGTH:theexisting of supportfor imprinting:-a study byRegolinandVallortigarasupports Lorenz’s idea for imprinting-chicks were exposed tosimple shape combinations that movedsuch as a triangle with a rectangle in font-arange of shape comboswere then moved infront of them and they followed theoriginal more closely-supports thatyoung animalsare both with aninnatemechanism to imprint on a moving object present in thecritical window of development

  LIMITATIONS:ability togeneralisefindings and conclusions from birds to human-themammalian attachment systemis quite different andmore complexthan birds-in mammals there is atwo way processwith the mothers also getting attached-probably not appropriate to generalise to humans

  STRENGTH:Guitondemonstrated thatchicksthat were exposed toyellow rubber glovesfor feeding the first few weeks-becameimprinted on the gloves-later, male chicks tried to mate with the gloves, but with experience preferred to mate wirh chicks-therefore supports that animals are not born with predisposition to imprint on a specific type of object butany moving thing-mating behaviour not as permenant as lorenz believed
• explain Harlow's research


  contact comfort: newborns kept alone in a bare cage often died but that they usually survived if given something soft to cuddlePROCEDURE:-he used16 baby monkeyswith twowire model mothers-one condition:milk dispensedfrom plain wire mother-one condition: milk dispensed fromcloth covered wire motherFINDINGS:-baby monkeys cuddledcloth covered motherin preference to wired motherwhen frightenedtheysought comfort.from the wired monkey more no matter which one was dispensing milk-this showedcontact comfortwas more important to monkeysthan food
• Maternally deprived monkeys as adults

  the monkeys who were kept with the wire monkeys grew up to bemore agressiveandless sociable, if they hadkids they often neglected themand in some cases killed them
• evaluate Harlow's research

  STRENGTH: its importantreal worldapplication-helpssocial workersandclinical psychologistsunderstand that a lack of bonding experience may be a risk factor inchild developmentallowing them to intervene to prevent poor outcomes-understand the importance of attachment figures for baby's monkeys in zoos and breeding programmes in the wild-highlycontrolled researchthat wouldn’t be able to to achieve with human infants

  
  

  LIMITATION: ability togeneralisefindings from monkeys to humans-rhesus monkeys are much more similar to humans than Lorenz's birds and all mammals share some similar attachment behaviour-however humanbrain and behaviour is still more complexso it may not be appropriate to generalise to humans
• who proposed the learning theory as an explanation for attachment?

  Dollard and Miller
• what are the two types of conditioning in learning theory

  classical and operant
• what is classical conditioning?


  -learning toassociate two stimuli togetherso that we begin to respond to one in the same way as we respond to the other-foodserves as anunconditioned stimulus-being fed gives uspleasurewhich is anunconditioned response-acaregiverstarts as aneutral stimulus-when the caregiver provides food over time they becomeassociatedwith food-the neutral stimulus becomes aconditioned stimulus-the sight of the caregiver produces aconditioned responseof pleasure
• what is operant conditioning?


  -learning from theconsequences of behaviour-if a behaviour produces apleasantconsequence, it is likely to berepeated againso the behaviour has becomereinforced-if the behaviour produces anunpleasantconsequence it is less likely to be repeated-this explains whybabies cry for comfort-this reinforcement is atwo way processwhich increases attachment
• explain attachment as a secondary drive

  -drive reduction-hunger can be thought of as aprimary drive- its innate, biological motivator-searssaid that as a caregiver provides food, the primary drive of hunger becomes generalised, attachment is thus asecondary drivelearned by association
• evaluate learning theory


  LIMITATION:lack of support from animal studies-Lorenz's geese imprinted, regardless of wether it was associated with food-Harlows monkeys chose the comfort mother over the one that provided milkLIMITATION:lack of support from studies of human babies-schaffer and Emersonfound that babies tended to form their main attachment to their mother regardless of whether she was the one that fed themSTRENGTH:elements of conditioning could be involved in attachment-unlikely that it is food, but conditioning defo-a baby may associate feelingwarm or comfortedwith a particular adult, and may influence their choice of main attachment figureHOWEVER:classical and operant conditioning see thebaby as a passive role in attachment developmentbutFeldman and Eidelmanshow they take active roles
• what was Bowlby's theory?

  Monotropic theory
• what are the 3 parts of Bowlby's theory?

  -monotropy

  -social releasers and the critical period

  -internal working model
• explain monotropy as a part of Bowlby's theory

  -great emphasis on the Childs attachment toone particular caregiverand that this is different and more important-themore time spentthe better-law of continuity:the more constant and predictable a Childs care, the better quality of their attachment-law of accumulated seperation: the effects of every separation from the mother adds up "the safest dose is therefore a zero dose"
• explain social releasers and the critical period as a part of Bowlby's theory

  -babies are born withinnate 'cute' behavioursthat encourageattention from adults- social releasers and the purpose is to make attachment-the critical period around 6 monthswhen an infants attachment system is active , more of asensitive period-6 months - 2 years-ifattachemt is not formed here, will be much harder to form one later
• explain internal working model as a part of Bowlby's theory


  -child forms amental representationlf their relationship with their primary attachment figure-servers as amodel for what relationships are like-affects a Childs ability to bea parent themselves
• evaluate Bowlby's monotropic theory


  LIMITATION:concept ofmonotropy lacks validity-schaffer and Emersonfound that although babies did attach to one person first, a majority formedmultiple attachments at the same time-the first does have a strong influence on other behaviour, thus may mean it isstronger not different in qualitySTRENGTH:evidence supporting social releasers-Brazelton et alobserved babies trigger interactions with adults using social releasers-then the attachment figures were made to ignore the babies social releasers-babies becameincreasingly distressedand some curled up and lay motionlessSTRENGTH:support for the internal working model-Bailey et alassessed attachment relationships in99 mothersand their 1 year old babies and measured attachment quality of the babies-mothersss with poor attachment in their own PAF, were more likely to be less attached to their babies
• who developed the strange situation?

  Mary Ainsworth and Silvia Bell (1969)
• what was the procedure of the strange situation?

  -controlled observationto measure the security of attachment between baby and caregiver-alab experimentin a room with atwo way mirrorbehaviours that they judged:-proximity seeking- a baby with good attachment will stay fairly close to caregiver-exploration and secure-base behaviour- good attachment enables a baby to feel confident to explore, using caregiver as a secure base-stranger anxiety- display of anxiety when stranger approaches-separation anxiety- display of anxiety when caregiver leaves-response to reunion- greet caregivers return with pleasure and comfort
• what were the 7 episodes of the procedure of the strange situation and what do they test?


  1)The baby is encouraged to explore- tests exploration and secure base2)A stranger comes in, talks to the caregiver and approaches baby- tests stranger anxiety3)The caregiver leaves the baby and stranger together- tests separation and stranger anxiety4)The caregiver returns and the stranger leaves- tests reunion behaviour and exploration/secure base5)The caregiver leaves the baby alone- tests separation anxiety6)The stranger returns-tests stranger anxiety7)The caregiver returns and is reunited with the baby- tests reunion behaviour
• what were the findings of the strange situation?


  - found 3 distincttypes of attachment:1)Secure attachment (type B): these babiesexplore happily, but regularly go back to the caregiver. showmoderate separation distressand moderatestranger anxietythey require and accept comfort in the reunion stage. Around60-75%2)Insecure-avoidant attachment (type A):babiesexplore freelyand do not seek proximity or show secure base behaviour. showlittle or no reactionto the caregiver leaves and havelittle stranger anxietylittle effort to make contact when caregiver returns.20-25%3)Insecure-resistant attachment (type C):seekgreater proximityandexplore less. they showhigh levels of stranger and separation distressbutresist comfortwhen reunited3%
• evaluate the strange situation


  STRENGTH:its outcome predicts a number of aspects of the baby's later development-research shown that babies and toddlers assessed as type B, tend to have better outcomes than others in later childhood and adulthood-eg better achievement in school and less involvement in bullying (McCormick et al) and. have better mental health in adulthood (Ward et al)-thus the strange situation measures something real and meaningful in a baby's developmentSTRENGTH:good inter-rater reliability-Bick et altested inter-rater reliability for the strange situation for a team of trained observers and found agreement of attachment type94%of cases-may be because of the controlled conditions and behaviours include movements that are easy to measureLIMITATION:may not be a valid measure of attachment in different cultural contexts-developed in Britain and USA-culture-bound as babies have different experiences in different cultures which may affect their response to the strange situation-Japanese study (Takahashi)babies displayed high levels of separation anxiety and a different number were classified as insecure-resistant-in Japan mother-baby separation is rare
• who conducted a study into cultural variation?

  van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg
• what did van Ijsendoorn and Kroonenberg do?

  -conducted a study to look at theproportionsofsecure, insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant attachmentacross a range of countries to assess cultural variation and variation within cultures
• what was the procedure of Ijsendoorn and Kroonenberg's study?


  -located32 studies of attachmentwhere the Strange Situation has been used toinvestigate the proportions of babieswith different attachment types.-conducted in8 different countries- 15 were in the USA-overall the studies yielded results for1990childrenthese 32 studies weremeta-analysed
• what were the findings of Ijsendoorn and Kroonenberg's study?


  -in all countries,secure attachmentwas themost commonclassification-proportion varied from75% in Britain to 50% in China-inindividualist cultures, rates of insecure-resistant attachment weresimilar to Ainsworthsbut incollectivistcountries, (China, Japan, Israel) where rates wereabove 25%(and insecure avoidant attachment were reduced)-variations between results within thesame country was 150% greater than between countrieseg in USA one study had 46% securely attached and another had 90%
• Who conducted the Italian study?

  Simonella et al (2014)
• what did Simonella et al (Italian study) do?

  -conducted a study in Italy to see wether the proportions of babies of different attachment types still matches those found in previous studies-researchers assessed76 babiesaged12 monthsin the Strange Situation-they found50% were securewith36% insecure-avoidant-this is lower than has been found in may studies-suggested it was because increasing number of mothers of very young children worklong hours and use professional childcare