Attachment Evaluation

+ Meltzoff and Moore: Newborns imitated adult movements

+ Murray and Trevarthen: Infants are distressed when there is no response

- Difficult to tell if imitation is just general or deliberate

- Marian et al.: Failed to replicate Murray's findings

- Isabella et al.: Individual differences - stronger bond = more interactions

+ Schaffer and Emerson

- Mothers reported own children - individual differences in sensitivity

- Biased sample, all working class from Glasgow

- Disagreements - Bowlby believes in montropy but Rutter believes all attachments are equal

- Cultural differences - Sagi: Collectivist cultures have more multiple attachments

- Stage theories inflexible (no individual or cultural differences)

+ Schaffer and Emerson: Men less likely to be PAFs

+ Heermann et al.: Men are less sensitive to infant cues

- Frank et al.: Single-parent families can have male PAFs

+ Guiton et al.: Leghorn chicks imprinted on yellow rubber gloves

- Guiton et al.: Imprinting can be reversed

- Extrapolation issues

- Extrapolation issues

- Lack of internal validity: different heads may be a confounding variable

- Ethical issues - distress caused to monkeys

- Research uses animals - cannot extrapolate

- Harlow: Contact comfort is more important than food

- Does not explain all behaviour as some increase discomfort e.g. bungee jumping

- Ignores Bowlby's theory

- Other factors such as attention may be involved other than food

+ Minnesota Parent-Child Study: Secure infants became more socially competent, popular and empathetic (continuity)

+ Grossmann and Grossmann: Healthy development requires one central person (PAF, supports monotropy)

- Attachment is not present at birth so not adaptive 

- Rutter et al.: Attachments can be formed after critical period, just more difficult. Rather 'sensitive' period than 'critical'

- Temperament hypothesis - infants with an easier temperament form stronger bonds as they are easier to interact with

+ Ainsworth et al. had 94% inter-rater reliability

+ Application - Circle of Security Project: teaching parents to understand infant signals. Increased secure attachment from 32% to 40%

- 4th attachment type - disorganised (i.e. no consistent patterns)

- Lack of internal validity - behaviour with only 1 parent tested

- Artificial environment = low ecological validity

- Lack of cultural validity

+ Universality: set of principles e.g. need for protection, shared across all cultures (cultural variations follow)

- Similarities may be explained by global factors e.g. mass media, rather than biology

- Compared countries, not cultures as many subultures exist. Study in Tokyo (urban) found results similar to USA

- Imposed etic - American method used in other countries

- Cultural bias - Insecure in USA may be secure in other countries

+ 44 Thieves: 12/14 affectionless thieves experienced separation

+ Application: Family visiting in hospital is now allowed

+ Bifulco et al.: 25% of deprived women had mental health problems compared to 15% non-deprived

+ Radke-Yarrow et al.: 55% of depressed mothers (not emotionally present) had insecure children compared to 29% of healthy mothers

- Rutter: Theory is unclear if it refers to privation (lack of a bond) or deprivation (loss of a bond). Privation has bigger effects than deprivation

+ Longitudinal studies prevent mistaken conclusions

+ Application: Babies are now adopted ASAP

- Individual differences: some children may have experienced favouritism (early experience of attachment), helped them to recover

- Other factors e.g. lack of cognitive stimulation and physical deprivation

- Institutionalisation may just slow, not stop, development

+ Simpson et al.: Longitudinal study supporting Hazan and Shaver's findings

- Research is retrospective (asking to recall childhood) - possibly innaccurate

- Research is correlational - cannot claim a cause-and-effect relationship

- Overly determinist - many insecure children have loving and long lasting adult relationships

- Fraley: Found correlations as low as .10

- Adults relationships may be guided by self-verification (seeking others who confirm your expectations)