Ainsworth’s ‘Strange Situation’

• Ainsworth's 'Strange Situation'


  A lab observation designed to measure the quality of attachment and the differences in attachment styles in infants
• Ainsworth's strange situation


  1. Mother and infant left to play

  2. Stranger enters and attempts to interact

  3. Mother leaves while stranger is in room

  4. Mother returns and stranger leaves

  5. Mother leaves

  6. Stranger returns

  7. Mother returns and stranger leaves
• What Ainsworth was looking for


  • How willing the infant was to explore the room
  • How the infant reacted to the stranger
  • How the infant reacted to being left
  • How the infant reacted upon reunion with the mother
• Ainsworth's classifications of infants


  • Type B Secure (70%)
  • Type A Insecure Avoidant (15%)
  • Type C Insecure Resistant (15%)
• Caregiver Sensitivity Hypothesis


  The mother's behaviour toward her infant will predict attachment type
• The majority of infants in Ainsworth's study were securely attached
• Positives of the Strange Situation


  • It is very reliable as it is very easy to repeat
  • There is inter-rater reliability as more than one observer was used and the experiment was filmed
  • Independent observers come to the same classifications of attachment
• Negatives of the Strange Situation


  • The population validity is low as it was a relatively small sample and all the participants came from similar socio-economic and geographical backgrounds
  • It lacks ecological validity as it does not represent tasks completed by caregivers-infants in real life
• Ainsworth was aware of the lack of ecological validity and had to sacrifice it for the control of a lab observation
• The Strange Situation may not be valid in other cultures where child-rearing practices are different
• The assumption that the mother was the Primary Caregiver may not be valid as the infant may have had different attachment styles with multiple attachments