Attachment

• Reciprocity


  Two-way; the child has to bond with the mother, and the mother has to bond with the child for an attachment to form successfully. They must both be able to contribute to the relationship and generate a response.
• Reciprocity

  • Importance in teaching the child to communicate
  • Allows the parent to better care for the child as they can detect certain cues from the baby and respond to their needs sooner and more effectively
• Interactional synchrony


  When the infant and primary caregiver become synchronised in their interactions
• Children can synchronise their movements with the sound of an adult's voice, and young infants can imitate the displayed distinctive facial expressions or gestures
• The way the two interact changes slightly according to the rhythm, pitch, volume etc of the adult's speech
• Interactional synchrony has been found to lead to better communication between the parent and child when the child is older
• Many of these studies used controlled observations, including filming the interactions from different angles, to ensure a high level of detail and accuracy and allow valid conclusions to be drawn through inter-rater reliability
• The main issue with observations of such young children is that we do not know whether their actions are meaningful, especially since children as young as 2 weeks old have little or no motor coordination
• Aim of Schaffer and Emerson's study


  To identify stages of attachment/find a pattern in the development of an attachment between infants and parents
• Schaffer and Emerson's study

  • Participants: 60 babies from Glasgow, all from the same estate
  • Procedure: Analysed the interactions between the infants and carers, interviewed the carers, and the mother had to keep a diary to track the infant's behaviours based on separation anxiety, stranger anxiety, and social referencing
  • Longitudinal study lasting 18 months, visiting the infants monthly and once again at the end
• They found that the babies of parents/carers who had 'sensitive responsiveness' - who were more sensitive to the baby's signals - were more likely to have formed an attachment
• Sensitive responsiveness was more important than the amount of time spent with the baby, so infants formed more attachments with those who spent less time with them but were more sensitive to their needs than those who spent more time with them but were less sensitive
• Infants who had parents who responded to their needs quickly and spent more time interacting with the child had more intense attachments. Those who had parents who did not interact with their child at all had very weak attachments
• Attachments seemed to form when the carer communicates and plays with the child rather than when the carer feeds or cleans the child
• Stages of attachment identified by Schaffer and Emerson

  • Asocial stage (0-6 weeks)
  • Indiscriminate attachments (6 weeks – 6 months)
  • Specific (7 months +)
  • Multiple (10/11 months +)
• Schaffer and Emerson found that 75% of the infants in their study formed a secondary attachment to their father by the age of 18 months, with 29% doing so within a month of forming a primary attachment, as demonstrated by separation anxiety
• Tiffany Field observed that primary caregivers, regardless of gender, were more attentive towards the infant and spent more time holding and smiling at them, suggesting that although mothers are often expected to become primary attachment figures, this does not always have to be the case
• There is still a lack of agreement over the extent of the influence of the father as a primary attachment figure, as demonstrated by the findings that children growing up in homosexual or single-parent families were not different compared to children with two heterosexual parents
• The gender of the primary caregiver is largely dictated by social and biological constraints, where women are expected to be caring and sensitive, and have higher levels of oestrogen and lower levels of testosterone compared to men
• Research into the importance of primary attach figures is socially sensitive, as later abnormalities in development are often blamed on the parent(s), which may pressure single fathers or mothers to return to work at a later point
• Imprinting


  Where animals will attach to the first moving object or person they see directly after birth
• Imprinting/the formation of an attachment must occur within the critical period of attachment development, which is usually the first 30 months of life, after which an attachment is not possible and the consequences of a failure to form an attachment are irreversible
• Harlow's research on rhesus monkeys


  Demonstrated the importance of contact comfort, where the baby monkeys would always seek comfort from the cloth-bound mother when scared, irrespective of which wire monkey was dispensing milk
• Harlow also reported developmental issues associated with the infant monkeys, even those who had the option of choosing the cloth-bound mother, such as being less skilled at mating, aggressive towards their own children, and socially reclusive
• Learning theory of attachment


  Views children as being born with blank slates, and everything they know is learned through their experiences, so a baby has to learn to form an attachment with its mother through classical and operant conditioning
• Classical conditioning


  The baby forms an association between the mother (a neutral stimulus) and the feeling of pleasure that comes with being fed (an innate unconditioned response)
• Operant conditioning


  The child carries out an action such as crying, which triggers a response, such as the mother coming to comfort or feed the baby, and the more this happens, the more the action is reinforced
• Stimulus


  Event that causes a response
• Response


  The action that happens as a result of a stimulus
• Innate


  Natural, from birth
• There is contradictory evidence from animal studies. For example, Harlow demonstrated that contact comfort was more important than food in the development of an attachment, where the baby monkeys formed a primary attachment to the cloth-bound mother, regardless of which mother was dispensing milk. This suggests that there is no unconditioned stimulus (of food) and even if there is, it has very little influence upon the formation of attachments.
• There is also contradictory evidence from human studies! For example, Brazleton et al emphasised the importance of interactional synchrony and reciprocity in the secure formation of attachments between a primary caregiver and infant - these are universal features of attachment. Attachments form not to the person who spends the most time with the infant, but rather the person who is most attentive to the infant and deals with their signals most skilfully. This means that the unconditioned stimulus of food is irrelevant in most cases!
• The focus on unconditioned and conditioned stimuli means that there is a loss of focus. Interactional synchrony and reciprocity are both universal features of attachment and should be treated as such, as demonstrated by Feldman and Brazleton. Learning theory does not account for these aspects and so is a limited explanation of only some aspects of attachment formation.
• Bowlby's Monotropic Theory of Attachment


  Evolutionary theory of attachment, stating that attachments are innate
• ASCMI (Bowlby's Monotropic Theory)


  • A = Adaptive - attachments are an advantage, or beneficial to survival as it ensures a child is kept safe, warm and fed
  • S = Social releasers - e.g. a cute face on a baby. These unlock the innate tendency for adults to care for a child because they activate the mammalian attachment system
  • C = Critical period - This is the time in which an attachment can form i.e. up to 2.5 to 3 years old. Bowby suggested that if an attachment is not formed in this time, it never will. If an attachment does not form, you will be socially, emotionally, intellecturally and physically stunted
  • M = Monotropy - means 'one carer'. Bowlby suggested that you can only form one special intense attachment (this is typically but not always with the mother). This attachment is unique, stronger and different to others. Maternal deprivation, which is characterised by a lack of a mother figure during the critical period for attachment formation, results in emotional and intellectual developmental deficits i.e. affection less psychopathy and mental retardation
  • I = Internal working model - This is an area in the brain, a mental schema for relationships where information that allows you to know how to behave around people is stored. Internal working models are our perception of the attachment we have with our primary attachment figure. Therefore, this explains similarities in attachment patterns across families. Those who have a dysfunctional internal working model will seek out dysfunctional relationships and behave dysfunctionally within them
• There is supporting evidence for the importance of internal working models, as presented by Bailey et al. Through the observation of 99 mothers and the recording of their children's attachment type using the Strange Situation, the researchers found that poor, insecure attachments coincided with the mothers themselves reporting poor attachments with their own parents. Therefore, this suggests that internal working models are likely to be formed during this first, initial attachment and that this has a significant impact upon the ability of children to become parents themselves later on in life.
• Monotropy is an example of socially sensitive research. Despite Bowlby not specifying that the primary attachment figure must be the mother, it often is (in 65% of cases). Therefore, this puts pressure on working mothers to delay their return to work in an effort to ensure that their child develops a secure attachment. Any developmental abnormalities in terms of attachment are therefore blamed on the mother by default. This suggests that the idea of monotropy may stigmatise 'poor mothers' and pressure them to take responsibility.
• Monotropy may not be evident in all children. For example, Schaffer and Emerson found that a small minority of children were able to form multiple attachments from the outset. This idea is also supported by van Izjendoorn and Kronenberg, who found that monotropy is scarce in collectivist cultures where the whole family is involved in raising and looking after the child. This means that monotropy is unlikely to be a universal feature of infant-caregiver attachments, as believed by Bowlby, and so is a strictly limited explanation of some cases of attachments.
• Ainsworth's 'Strange Situation'


  A procedure to assess how securely attached a child is to its caregiver, and if it is insecurely attached, to assess which type of insecure attachment it has
• Secure attachment


  Infant shows some separation anxiety when parent/caregiver leaves but can be easily soothed when they return. Securely attached infant is able to play independently but uses parent/caregiver as a safe base to explore new environment. Usually accounts for 65% of children.