AO1

• What is a cultural variation? What does research suggest?

  A cultural variation refers to differences in norms/values across groups of different people (cultures). Research suggests that Cultural variations influence attachment styles.
• Who conducted a meta analysis, how many people, studies & countries? What was the aim

  Van ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg conducted a meta-analysis of 32 studieds, consisting of 1990 children from 8 different countries to assess the proportion of attachment types in different countries as a result of cultural variations
• What was the most common attachment type found by the meta analysis and what does this support

  The most common attachment type in all countries was the secure attachment, but in differing proportions across countries (75% In Britain and 50% in China). This supports bowlby's idea that attachment is innate and universal
• What country had highest insecure-avoidant and why?

  Germany had the highest percentage of insecure-avoidant attachments at 30% and it has been suggested that this is due to the nature of Germany as an individualistic culture, which teaches children to be independent.
• What countries had highest % of insecure-resistant and why?

  Collectivist cultures such as Japan and Israel were found to have the highest percentage of insecure resistant attachments (Japan 25% and Israel 25%), however, China displayed an equal percentage of both 25% resistant and 25% avoidant.
• What did they find out about differences inter-culturally and intra-culturally and why?

  Intracultural differences were found to be greater than inter-cultural differences, this can largely be attributed to economic disparities within countries, which grant financially stable parents a greater amount of time with their infants, allowing them to foster greater sensitive-responsiveness and thus secure attachments,
• Korean researcher? How many children? What did he find? what country was their proportion similar to

  Jin et al conducted research into attachment types on 87 Korean children using the SS. Found that highest percentage of attachments were secure, however, when insecure attachments were found, majority were insecure-avoidant, with only one being insecure resistant. The proportion of attachment types found were similar to the distribution found in Japan (due to similar child-rearing practices between japanese and Koreans)
• Italian researcher, how many children?

  Simon Eli et al conducted research using 76 italian children (aged 12 months) in a ss. He found that there was a significant difference to the proposed attachment types, as he found the percentage of secure attachment to be lower 50% and the insecure-avoidant attachment to be found 36% of the time.
• Was the italian researchers findings any different and if so, why?

  This differs to the findings suggested by the meta-analysis which showed a larger proportion of secure attachments and lower number of resistant ones. He attributed this to increasing % of mums working long hours + placing children in professional childcare