Influence of early attachment onchildhood&adultrelationships

• Bowlby (1969)


  Argued that a child's attachment with their parents forms a template for future relationships
• Monotropic attachment


  The main primary attachment an infant forms is more important than other secondary attachments
• Internal working model


  Represents a mental view of the relationship with the primary caregiver and informs a child's interactions with other children and their own future attachments
• HAZAN AND SHAVER (1987) - LOVE QUIZ

  Placed a love quiz in the local newspaper with questions about attachment history, current attachment experiences and attitudes towards love, assessing attachment types and the internal working model
• The prevalence of current attachment styles were similar to that from infancy
• A positive correlation between attachment type and love experiences as well as a relationship between the concept of love and attachment type
• Attachment type


  Associated with the quality of peer relationships in childhood
• Securely attached infants tend to go on and form the best quality childhood friendships whereas insecurely attached infants later have friendship difficulties
• Bullying behaviour can be predicted by attachment type. Smith et al (1998) found that secure children were very unlikely to be involved in bullying, insecure-resistant children were most likely to be bullies and insecure-avoidant children were most likely to be victims
• Secure attachment with caregiver during childhood

  May go on to have close relationships as adults with others, including their own children
• Insecure-resistant attachment with caregiver

  May feel less able to get close to others in adult relationships
• Continuity hypothesis


  Represents a continuity in the quality and type of relationships not only with the child and their own adult relationships, but this template continues across generations
• Strengths of the influence of early attachment

  • Research has practical applications. By getting an improved understanding of the influences on relationships, we can develop strategies to improve people's relationship success
• Evidence against the idea that early attachments shape our adult relationships comes from the case of the Czech twins. After being locked up for 7 years by their stepmother, when the Czech twins were discovered, the twin boys couldn't talk. They were looked after by two loving sisters and by age 14 they had near normal intellectual and social functioning. By the age of 20, they were above average intelligence and had formed strong attachments
• This goes against the predictions of the internal working model because it suggests that negative experiences during early life may not be permanent and are in fact reversible