Childhood attachment and adult personality: A life history perspective. Self and Identity. The nature of the child's tie to his mother. International Journal of Psychoanalysis. The development of social attachments in infancy. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development.
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I Accept Show Purposes. Table of Contents View All. Table of Contents. Attachment Theory. Stages of Attachement. Patterns of Attachment. Impact of Early Attachment. The Theme of Attachment Theory The central theme of attachment theory is that primary caregivers who are available and responsive to an infant's needs allow the child to develop a sense of security.
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Bowlby, J. Attachment and loss. OKS Print. New York: Basic Books. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum; Ainsworth MDS. In: Attachment Across the Life Cycle. London: Routledge; Attachment and Loss: Volume 1 Attachment.
New York: Basic Books; Related Articles. What Is Fearful Avoidant Attachment? Do You Have Attachment Anxiety? Coping With Separation Anxiety in Relationships.
What Is a Toxic Mother? What to Know About Attachment Therapy. Disorganised attachment is a combination of avoidant and anxious attachment, and children that fit into this group often display intense anger and rage. They may break toys and behave in other volatile ways — they also have difficult relationships with caregivers. In the s, developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth did a study on infants between the ages of months old; the study observed attachment security in children within the paradigm of caregiver relationships.
This involved eight short episodes lasting around 3 minutes where a mother, child, and stranger are introduced, separated and then reunited. Using the strange situation model, Ainsworth studied one to two-year-olds to determine the styles of attachment and the nature of attachments displayed between mother and child. The set up was conducted in a small room with one way glass so that the children could be easily observed.
In short episodes, the children, mothers and experimenters were observed in the following eight scenarios:. After the study, Ainsworth scored each of the responses and grouped them into four interaction behaviours: closeness and contact seeking, maintaining contact, avoidance of closeness and contact, resistance to contact and proximity. These interactions were based on two reunion episodes during the observation.
These infants are easily reassured by primary caregivers and children who develop under this style are nurtured and are given encouragement from caregivers, allowing them a safe platform to develop securely. Children who fall under the avoidant style tend not to look to their caregiver when exploring their environment.
Such children are likely to have a caregiver who is insensitive and rejecting of their needs Ainsworth, The child is not easily comforted by the caregiver and often demonstrates clingy and dependent behaviour towards an attachment figure yet still rejects them in times of interaction. When exploring their environment, the child displays difficulty in separating from the attachment figure. Ainsworth concluded that this behaviour is due to a lack of consistency delivered from caregiver to child.
Intensely attached infants had mothers who responded quickly to their demands and, interacted with their child. Infants who were weakly attached had mothers who failed to interact. The most important fact in forming attachments is not who feeds and changes the child but who plays and communicates with him or her. Therefore, sensitive responsiveness to the baby's signals, appeared to be the key to attachment.
The Schaffer and Emerson study has low population validity. The infants in the study all came from Glasgow and were mostly from working class families.
In addition, the small sample size of 60 families reduces the strength of the conclusion we can draw from the study. However, accuracy of data collection by parents who were keeping daily diaries whilst clearly being very busy could be questioned.
A diary like this is also very unreliable with demand characteristics and social desirability being major issues. Mothers are not lkely to report negative experiences in their daily write up. The study lacks historical validity. It was conducted in the s when gender roles were different — Now, more men stay at home to look after their children and more women go out to work so the sample is biased.
Psychologists have proposed two main theories that are believed to be important in forming attachments. Once the neutral stimuli which in this context is the mother present while the child is eating is consistently associated with an unconditioned stimulus and will eventually produce the same response. The mother then becomes a learned conditioned stimulus and produces a conditioned response. This then results in the mother once seen by the infant gives the child a sense of pleasure which is a conditioned response.
Operant conditioning was first investigated by Skinner and then further investigated by Dollard and Miller in regard of attachment and drive reduction theory which describes something that motivates behavior. This was then investigated as when an infant is hungry there is a drive to reduce the discomfort which happens as a result.
Once the child is fed this produces a feeling of pleasure which is positive reinforcement. Behavior which is rewarded by food is repeated and food becomes the primary reinforcer as it is associated with a reward and reinforces the behavior. The person supplying the food which can be the mother or primary caregiver becomes a secondary reinforcer as they become the source of the reward.
Conclusively, the attachment occurs because the child associates the person who supplies the food with rewards and seeks them. The evolutionary theory of attachment e. The determinant of attachment is not food, but care and responsiveness. Bowlby suggested that a child would initially form only one primary attachment monotropy and that the attachment figure acted as a secure base for exploring the world. The attachment relationship acts as a prototype for all future social relationships so disrupting it can have severe consequences.
This theory also suggests that there is a critical period for developing an attachment about 0 -5 years. If an attachment has not developed during this period, then the child will suffer from irreversible developmental consequences, such as reduced intelligence and increased aggression.
McLeod, S. Attachment theory. Simply Psychology. Ainsworth, M. Attachment, exploration, and separation: Illustrated by the behavior of one-year-olds in a strange situation. Child Development, 41 ,
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