Attachment Theories

• Aim of Harlow's study:

  • to investigate whether contact comfort or provision of food is more important in forming infant-mother attachment for rhesus monkeys
• Method of Harlow's study:

  • he used two surrogate mothers, one made out of wire and the other was made of cloth
  • 4 monkeys had bottle on wire mother and 4 had bottle on cloth mother
• Results of Harlow's study:

  • infants spent most time clinging onto the soft mother even when hungry, suggesting that contact comfort is more important than food in forming attachments.
• Attachment:

  • strong emotional connection between and infant and their main attachment figure
• Bowlby's monotropic theory:

  • he theorised that childeren have a biological need to form a bond with one main attachment figure, this bond is more important than that with any other attachment figures, it is usually to the mother
• Monotropy:

  • attachment with only one attachment figure
• Bowlby's maternal deprivation hypothisis:

  • theorised that first two-and-a-half years or life was a critical period for forming attachment with a main attachment figure.
  • claimed that if child failed to form attahcment within this period, they would find it difficult to form an attachment later in life.
• Critical period:

  • lifespan stage during which inderviduals are more sensitive to a environmental influences and normal development relys on these particular life experiences occuring.
• Maternal deprivation:

  • consequence an indervidual experiences when they are separated from their mother as a child and attachment is prevented from occuring
  • interlectual development may be delayed, low IQ
  • emotional development affected, especially ability to have empathy for others
  • difficulties forming social relationships with others
• Internal working model:

  • during first years of life childeren develope internal working model of themselves, primary caregiver/s and interactions they have with others
  • they are mental representations which serve as a template, or model for what relationships are like
• Internal working model of others:

  • by age of 5, childeren lave learned a great deal about their caregivers and now have an internal working model of their likes, dislikes, and personality characteristics
• Internal wokring model of self:

  • child may create positive internal working model whereby they come to belive they are worthy of love and comfort due to caregivers being sensitive to needs
  • negative internal working model may develope when caregivers have constantly rejected child and ignored their needs
• Internal working model of relationship between self and others:

  • child will base future relationship with other people on their first relationships with primary caregivers,
  • depending on nature of mother-child relationship child will influence expectations of future relationships.
• Evolutionary perspective:

  • bowlby belived purpouse of attachment behaviod was to protect infant from predators and allow for survival of species.
• Strengths of Bowbly' theory:

  • it lead to numerouse orphan studies
  • provides strong reasoning for the relationships that adults form
• Limitations of Bowlby's theory:

  • bowbly belived mothers were primary caregiver although majority of societies around world observed to have multiple attachment figure involved in raising childeren
• Ainsworth's study:

  • Ainsworth developed 3 types of attachment and belived that the types of attachment relationship formed between mother and child depend on how sensative and responsive the mother was to her childs signals
• Aim of Ainsworths study:

  • to measure the quality of attachment younge childeren had with their main attachment figure
• Method of Ainsworth's study:

  • 100 1 year old childeren and their mothers
  • insensities of 5 behaviors were recorded when infant was put into different situations involving the mother and a stranger leaving and returning to the rooms
  • behaviors recorded: proximity seeking, exporation and secure-base behavior, stranger and seperation anxiety and response to reunion.
• Proximity seeking:

  • whether or not an infant stays in close proximity to mother
• explorations and secure-base behavior:

  • how confidant baby feels to explore environment, while using mother as secure base to return to
• stranger anxiety:

  • how anxiouse baby becomes when aorund stranger
• Seperation anxiety:

  • how anxiouse baby becomes when seperated from mother
• response to reunion:

  • behavior shows by baby when reunited with their mother after a period of seperation
• Type A attachment:

  • insecure avoidant attachment
  • proximity seeking:dose not seek proximity to mother
  • exploration/secure base: happy to explore, dosent use mother as base
  • stranger anxiety: low
  • seperation anxiety: low
  • response to reunion: little to no intrest when mother returns
  • mother behavior: ignores infant (infant comes to belive communication of need has no influence on mother)
• Type B attachment:

  • secure attachment
  • proximity seeking: happy to seek proximity from mother
  • exploration/secure base: happy to explore uses mother as base
  • stranger anxiety: moderate
  • seperation anxiety: moderate
  • response to reunion: happy and seeks comfort
  • mother behavior: mother sensitive to infants needs
• Type C attachment:

  • Insecure resistant attachment
  • Proximity seeking: seeks great proximity to mother
  • Exploration/secure base: explores very little, dosent use mother as base
  • Stranger anxiety: high
  • Seperation anxiety: high
  • Response to reunion: may approach mother but resists comfort
  • Mother behavior: inconsistant with primary care - sometimes ignores needs, sometimes meets needs
• Contributions of Ainsworth's study:

  • provided first empirical evidance for bowlby's attachment theory
• Critisism of Ainsworth's study:

  • some belives the infants were caused a degree of psychological harm due to distress caused
  • only valid for western Europe and USA as it was developed in these locations
• Ijzendoorn and Kroonenbergs findings:

  • Type A: insecure avoidant attahcments more prevalent in Western European countries and USA than in China, Japan and Israel.
  • most common attachment type across all contries was Type B: secure attachment
  • Type C: insecure resistant attachment was more prevalent in Japan and Israel tha any of the included countries.
• Enriched environment:

  • the social and physical surroundings that facilitate intellectual and sensory stimulation.
  • belives to greatly impact early development of childeren
• Deprived environment:

  • absence of conditions that stimulate the senses and allow for intellectual growth
  • can lead to poor social skills
• Genie the wild child:

  • harnessed to potty seat naked, not allowed to make any noise
  • found to have weak vocal chords and jaw muscles