Attachment theory

Attachment is an emotional bond that connects one person to another. It is characterised by behaviours in children, such as proximity seeking behaviours. Attachment behaviour in adults towards the child includes responding appropriately to the child's needs.

Attachment theory provides an explanation of how the parent-child relationship emerges and influences development. It addresses how humans respond within relationships when hurt, separated from loved ones, or perceiving a threat. Essentially all infants become attached if provided with any caregiver, but there are individual difference sin the quality of the relationships.

In infants, attachment is a motivational and behavioural system the directs the child to seek proximity with a familiar caregiver when they're alarmed, with the expectation they'll receive protection and emotional support.

Bowlby believed that the tendency for primate infants to develop attachments to familiar caregivers was the result of evolutionary processes, since attachment behaviour would aid survival in the face of dangers such as predation or exposure to the elements.

In the 1930s, Bowlby worked as a psychiatrist in a child guidance clinic in London, where he treated maladjusted, and emotionally disturbed children. This experience led Bowlby to consider the importance of the child's relationship with their mother in terms of their social, emotional, and cognitive development. He observed that children experienced intense distress when separated from their mothers. 

Bowlby proposed that attachment could be understood in an evolutionary context - the caregiver provides safety and security for the child. Attachment is adaptive because it enhances the child's chance of survival. Children are biologically programmed to form attachments due to this. Children produce innate social releaser behaviours that provoke innate caregiving responses from adults.

Children initially form 1 primary attachment, and this figure acts as a secure base for exploring the world and making future social relationships. The critical period for developing attachmetns is 0-5 years. If attachment has not been developed by then, the child will suffer developmental consequences.

Like Bowlby, Ainsworth was also a key figure in developing attachment theory. She devised an assessment technique called the Strange Situation Classification in order to investigate how attachments might vary between children. The experiment was conducted by observing the behaviour of the infant in a series of 8 episodes:

• (1) mother, baby and experimenter
• (2) mother and baby alone
• (3) stranger joins mother and baby
• (4) mother leaves baby and stranger alone
• (5) mother returns and stranger leaves
• (6) mother leaves, infant is left completely alone
• (7) stranger returns
• (8) mother returns and stranger leaves

Attachment styles were based primarily on 4 interaction behaviours directed towards the mother in the 2 reuinion episodes: (1) proximity and contact seeking behaviour (2) contact maintaining (3) avoidance of proximity and contact (4) resistance to contact and comforting

(1) Secure attachment
A child who is securely attached to their caregiver will explore freely while the caregiver is present, typically engages with strangers, is often visibly upset when caregiver departs and is happy to see the caregiver return. Parents who consistently respond to their child's needs will create securely attached children

(2) Anxious-ambivalent attachment
Children with an anxious ambivalent pattern of attachment will typically explore little, and is often wary of strangers, even with the mother present. When the mother departs, the child is often highly distressed. The child is generally ambivalent when she returns. The anxious ambivalent strategy is a response to unpredictably responsive caregiving

(3) Anxious-avoidant attachment
An infant with an anxious avoidant attachment will avoid or ignore the caregiver, showing little emotion when they depart or return. The infant doesn't explore much regardless of who is there. These childrens' behaviour was often the result of a caregiver not meeting their needs so the infant had come to believe that communication of emotional needs had no influence on the caregiver

Ainsworth had some difficulty classifying all the children that she studied with the Strange Situation paradigm with only 3 categories. A fourth classification was added by Ainsworth's colleague, Mary Main.

(4) Disorganised/disorientated attachment
In the Strange Situation, the attachment system is expected to be activated by the departure and return of the caregiver. If the behaviour of the infant doesn't appear to be coordinated in a smooth way across episodes, then it is considered 'disorganised' as it indicates a disruption or flooding of the attachment system (e.g from fear). Infant behaviours in the Strange Situation Protocol coded as disorganised include overt displays of fear, contradictory behaviours occurring simultaneously or sequentially, asymmetric, misdirected or jerky movements, or freezing and apparent dissociation.

Schaffer & Emerson (1964) studied 60 babies at monthly intervals for the first 18 months of their life. They discovered that babies attachments develop in the following sequence:

Asocial (0-6 weeks)
Very young infants are asocial in that many kinds of stimuli, both social and non-social produce a favourable reaction, such as a smile

Indiscriminate attachments (6 weeks - 7 months)
Infants indiscriminately enjoy human company and most babies respond equally to any caregiver. They get upset when an individual ceases to interact with them

Specific attachment (7 - 9 months)
Special preference for a single attachment figure develops. Baby looks to particular people for security, comofrt and protection. Show stranger fear and separation anxiety.

Multiple attachment (10 months +)
Baby becomes increasingly independent and forms several attachments. By 18 months, majority of infants have formed multiple attachments

Harlow explained that attachment developed as a result of the mother providing tactile comfort, this suggests infants have an innate need to touch and cling to something for emotional comfort.

In one study, Harlow took monkey babies and isolated them at birth. They had no contact with anyone. He kept some this way for 3 months, some for 6, some for 9, and some for 12. He then put them back with other monkeys to see what effect this would have on their ability to form attachment. They monkeys engaged in bizarre behaviour such as rocking compulsively. They were unable to communicate or socialise with other monkeys, who bullied them. They tore their hair out, scratched themselves, and bit their own limbs. Harlow concluded privation was permanently damaging. Those isolated for 3 months were the least effected, those isolated for a year never recovered.

In another study, Harlow took 8 monkey babies from their mother at birth and placed them in cages with access to 2 "surrogate mothers", one made of cloth and one made of wire. 4 could get milk from the wire mother and 4 could get milk from the cloth mother. Both groups spent more time with the cloth mother, even if she had no milk. They would only go to the wire mother when hungry, and afterwards would return to the cloth mother. The monkeys formed an attachment with the cloth mother

Lorenz (1935) took a large clutch of goose eggs, and placed half under a goose mother, and kept half beside himself. When the geese hatched, Lorenz imitated a mother goose's quacking sound. The geese regarded him as their mother and followed accordingly. The other group followed the mother goose.

Lorenz found that geese follow the first moving object they see during a 12-17 hour critical period. This process is known as imprinting. Imprinting aids survival in the short-term. To ensure that imprinting had occurred, Lorenz put all the goslings together under an upturned box and allowed them to mix. When the box was removed, the two groups separated to go to their respective "mothers" - half to the goose, and half to Lorenz.