[2] Schaffer's Stages of Attachment

• STAGE 1: ASOCIAL

  • 1st few weeks
  • behaviour towards humans and inanimate objects are similar
  • show a preference for the company of familiar people and are more easily comforted by them
  • baby is forming bonds
• STAGE 2: INDISCRIMINATE

  • 2 to 7 months
  • show a clear preference for being with humans rather than inanimate objects
  • babies accept cuddles and comfort from anyone
  • THEY DO NOT SHOW SEPARATION (when the caregiver leaves) OR STRANGER (presence of unfamiliar people) ANXIETY
• STAGE 3: SPECIFIC

  • Around 7 months
  • babies start to display signs of attachment towards one particular person; they show separation and stranger anxiety i.e. that person is their primary attachment figure
  • this 'person' is not necessarily the individual the child spends most time with but the one who offers the most interaction and responds to the baby's signals - this is the baby's mother in 65% of cases
• STAGE 4: MULTIPLE

  • shortly after babies start to show attachment behaviour (e.g. separation + stranger anxiety) towards 1 person, they usually extend this behaviour to multiple attachments with other people whom they regularly spend time with aka secondary attachments
  • [Schaffer and Emerson] observed that 29% of the children formed secondary attachments within a month of forming a primary (specific) attachment
  • By the age of 1, the majority of babies had developed multiple attachments
• SCHAFFER AND EMERSON'S RESEARCH

  • 1964
  • based their stage theory on an observational study of the formation of early infant-adult attachments
• SCHAFFER AND EMERSON'S RESEARCH; PROCEDURE

  • study involved 60 babies - 31bs and 29gs.
  • all from Glasgow + majority were from skilled working-class families
  • researchers visited babies and mothers in their own homes every month for the 1st year and again at 18 months
  • researchers asked the mothers questions about the kind of protest their babies showed in 7 everyday separations, e.g. separation and stranger anxiety
  • this was designed to measure the babies' attachment
• SCHAFFER AND EMERSON'S RESEARCH; FINDINGS

  • they identified 4 distinct stages in the development of infant attachment behaviours (basically the stages)