Attachment

• Attachment


  When two people develop long and lasting emotional bonds, in this case the infant and their caregiver. Both the infant and caregiver seek closeness to each other and feel secure when close to their attachment figure.
• Reciprocity


  A mutual turn-taking form of interaction, like a conversation with each person playing close attention and responding to the other's signals and cues.
• Interactional synchrony


  Simultaneous interaction where the infant and caregiver act at the same time, appearing coordinated with matching behavior and emotional states.
• Sensitive responsiveness


  The caregiver carefully paying attention to the infant's communication and responding appropriately, such as comforting, feeding or changing the infant depending on what they are trying to communicate.
• Child-directed speech


  A sing-song voice with variable tone, used to keep the infant's attention, also known as motherese or infant-directed speech.
• Bodily contact, including breastfeeding, is seen as vital for developing an attachment.
• Evaluations of caregiver-infant interaction research

  • Use of multiple observers or recorded interactions to allow careful analysis
  • Inferences about internal mental states are ultimately guesses, not truly scientific
  • Findings are socially sensitive and can influence how parents interact with their infants
• Stages of attachment identified by Schaffer

  • Stage 1 (birth to 6 weeks): Asocial stage - infants display behaviors like crying and smiling to any caregiver
  • Stage 2 (6 weeks to 7 months): Indiscriminate attachment - infants can tell difference between familiar and unfamiliar adults but don't show separation or stranger anxiety
  • Stage 3 (5-9 months): Specific attachment - infants form strong connection to primary caregiver, usually mother, showing separation anxiety when they leave
  • Stage 4 (9-10 months): Multiple attachment - infants develop attachments to other caregivers like fathers, siblings, and grandparents, with decreased stranger anxiety
• Schaffer's study found the strongest attachments formed between infants and mothers where the mothers consistently interacted with their infants.
• Schaffer's study found that initially, the father's role was not as important as the mother's, but by 18 months, 75% of infants had developed some attachment to the father.
• Father's role

  Provide active play activities to encourage risk-taking behavior, rather than the caring and comforting sensitive responsiveness shown by mothers.
• Research suggests that when fathers are the primary caregiver, their interactional style shifts to more sensitive responsiveness.
• The best predictor of making friends in school was a strong attachment to the father, not the mother.
• Researching the father's role in infant development is socially sensitive, as findings could impact single fathers, gay couples, and legislation around paternity leave.
• Animal behavior


  Fascinating, psychologists study why animals act the way they do
• Psychological findings on animal behavior


  Often applied to human behavior
• Animal research can be problematic both ethically and considering the very different mental experiences of animals and humans
• Attachment research


  Influential work by Konrad Lorenz and Harry Harlow
• Lorenz's work on imprinting


  1. Randomly divided goose eggs, half hatched naturally, half hatched by Lorenz

  2. Goslings hatched by mother followed her, goslings hatched by Lorenz imprinted on him

  3. Found a critical period of around 32 hours for imprinting
• Lorenz's work provides evidence for a biological aspect to attachment behavior in birds and that the process of imprinting is based on vision
• Harlow's experiment on attachment

  1. Removed infant monkeys from mothers, placed in cage with wire mother with milk and cloth mother without food

  2. Monkeys spent most time with cloth mother, ran to cloth mother when frightened
• Harlow's research found that animals like the monkeys in his study have an innate need for physical contact
• Applying animal research to humans

  Animals and humans are very different biologically and in terms of brain structure and societal/cultural influences
• John Bowlby


  Researcher who used Lorenz and Harlow's findings to argue human infants crave comfort from mothers and have a critical period for attachment
• Later research showed humans have a sensitive period, not a critical period, for attachment
• Knowledge from Lorenz and Harlow's work influenced child care practices like encouraging immediate physical contact between mothers and babies
• Harlow's research was unethical, subjecting primates to suffering, but ultimately led to an understanding of the importance of early attachment that has improved infant care
• Unethical studies don't necessarily invalidate the data collected, it just means the cost-benefit analysis is more complex
• Attachment


  The strong bond that develops between an infant and their primary caregiver, usually their biological mother
• Infant and primary caregiver

  Develop a strong bond quickly
• Biological psychologists' view on attachment

  • Attachment bond is innate, babies are primed with the need to attach to their mother figures, and caregivers have an innate response to care for them
• Behaviorist view on attachment

  • Babies just really need to be fed, and they love their mother because she is the best way to get food, parents' love for infants is more relief that the baby has stopped crying
• Classical conditioning explanation of attachment

  1. Neutral stimulus (mother) becomes associated with unconditioned stimulus (food), resulting in conditioned response (pleasure)

  2. Infant learns association between mother and food
• Operant conditioning explanation of attachment

  1. Crying behavior is positively reinforced when parent provides milk (positive reinforcement)

  2. Crying behavior is negatively reinforced when parent provides care and stops the unpleasant stimulus
• Primary drives


  Instinctual desires required for survival and reproduction (e.g. sleep, hunger, thirst, sex)
• Secondary drives


  Learned desires that can ultimately satisfy primary drives (e.g. money)
• Attachment as a secondary drive


  Infants seek attachment with their mothers because they learn the mother will ultimately satisfy their primary drive of hunger
• Bowlby's Monotropic Theory


  • Infants are naturally driven to form a strong bond with their primary caregiver (usually the mother) as this is crucial for survival
  • Infants are born with innate behaviors like crying, smiling, and vocalizing to draw the caregiver's attention
  • Caregivers are biologically prepared to respond to these signals instinctively
• Critical period


  The first 30 months after birth, during which the primary attachment must form or it could lead to lasting negative impacts
• Internal working model


  A set of schemas formed about relationships, guiding beliefs on whether people are trustworthy and if expressions of love are normal