Attachment

• They conducted a longitudinal study at monthly intervals for the first 18 months of life
• The observational method recorded the interactions of babies with their carers
• The carers were also interviewed

Findings

Up to 3 months: Asocial stage = Predisposition to attach to any human. Does not show wariness of strangers

4-7 months: Indescriminate stage = Distinguishes between primary and secondary caregivers. Preference for certain people

7-9 months: Specific stage = Preference for a single attachment figure. Show stranger anxiety and separation anxiety, attachment has been made

9 months onwards: Multiple stage = Multiple attachments. By 10 months, children become   independent and will have made several attachments

Strengths

• Needs of babies and children in emotional relationships were studied in depth for the first time
• Good external validity - Carried out in families' homes, means pps likely to behave normally
• Lonitudinal design - Better internal validity because there isn't individual differences between the participants

Limitations

• Limited sample characteristics - All the families were from the same district and social class
• Problem studying the asocial stage - Babies that ar young have poor co-ordination, so it is difficult to make judgements on their physical behaviour
• Conflicting evidence on multiple attachments - Van Ijzendoorn et al (1993) suggested that babies form multiple attachments from the outset

Aim: To see if goslings follow the first large moving object that they see after hatching

Procedure

• Lorenz divided a large clutch of goose eggs into two groups
• One group was hatched by the mother and spent their first moments after hatching with their mother
• The other group was placed in an incubator and would spend their first moments after hatching with Lorenz

Findings

• The mother group immediately followed the mother and the incubator group followed Lorenz
• They had followed the first seen object
• Later, both groups were put together and, on release, each group followed their respective mothers

Conclusions

• 'Imprinting' had occurred
• Imprinting was a natural instinct which directs the gosling to attach themselves to the first moving object that they see, they quickly learn to distinguish the object from other objects
• Lorenz argued this happens during the critical period, which he found probably happened between 13-16 hours
• He saw imprinting as an adaptive behaviour

Strengths

• Lorenz showed that imprinting occurred without food being involved, suggesting imprinting itself was a primary drive
• Led to further research as to how attachments are made

Limitations

• Later researchers found that the criticial period had a wider window of time. Hess (1958), found that ducks will readily imprint first 24 hours, but could also imprint after this period
• Geese are precocial species and perhaps should not be compared with human (altrical) behaviour. Precocial species attach were as altrical species bond
• Lorenz's results may not be applicable to humans because of the differences between precocial and altrical species

Aims

• To investigate the factors in forming attachment
• To challenge the 'cupboard love' theory

Procedure

• 8 newborn monkeys were removed from their mothers and isolated in cages with 2 surrogate mothers
• One cage was made of wire and the other was covered in cloth
• 4 of the monkeys received milk attached to the wire mother and the other 4 had milk from the cloth mother

Findings

• 'Wire-fed' monkeys only visited for food, where as the 'cloth-fed' monkeys visited for food and comfort
• In times of fear, both groups went to the cloth mother for comfort. Despite the monkeys having their food in the wire cage, they searched for comfort instead of food
• This was shown when a mechanical teddy bear beating a drum was placed
• This was shown when a mechnanical teddy bear beating a drum was placed in the cage, where all 8 monkeys ran to the cloth mother and clung to her.
• Attachment was not sufficient for normal social development, because when older, they showed indifference or were abusive to other monkeys

Conclusion

• The conclusion of the study of the study was that the basis of attachment was comfort and security rather than food.

Strengths

• It stimulated more research into human attachment. 
• Study has research support. Klaus and Kennel in 1976 found that contact comfort was very important for good attachment.
• Harlow’s further research showed that more was needed than warmth and comfort for normal healthy development. Research shows that social contact is vital for normal psychological development.

Limitations

• Results are from an animal study, so caution needs to be taken to generalise to humans
• Harlow did not recognise the different kinds of contact. Not the quantity of contact that matters, it's the quality 
• The study breaks the BPS code of ethics, there are serious ethical issues

Monotropy

• Infants form a single special attachment with one primary attachment figure, this is innate
• Law of continuity = The more constant and predictable a child's care the better the quality of their attachment
• Law of accumulated separation = The effects of every separation from the mum adds up

Social releasers and the critical period

• Social releasers = Innate behaviours babies are programmed to engage in to keep the caregiver close, like smiling and crying
• Critical period = Bowlby suggests that attachment takes during a critical period. If a child does not form attachment before 2.5 years, attachment will not occur

Internal Working Model

• Emotional bond between caregiver and the baby sets expectations which stay throughout life
• A template for all future relationships 

Strengths

• Cross-cultural replications - Ainsworth observed the Ganda tribe of Uganda. Infants form one primary attachment even when reared by multiple carers
• The study changed attitudes towards child rearing and care in hospitals and institutions. Previously, only medical needs were considered important, but when Bowlby's ideas were put into practice, children recovered better

Limitations

• Other research shows that babies do form multiple attachments (Schaffer an Emerson)
• The critical period was found to be less rigid than stated by Bowlby
• Importance of monotropy may be overemphasised - Van Izjendoorn (1987) found that a stable network of adults can provide adequate or better care than a mother alone

Aim

• To assess the type of attachment a child develops with its caregiver

Procedure

• The caregiver brings the child into the room and puts child on the floor. Caregiver sits on a chair and does not interact with child unless the child seeks attention
• A stranger enters the room and talks with caregiver. Stranger approaches the child with a toy
• Caregiver leaves. Stranger tries to interest the child in a toy if the child is passive, or give comfort if the child becomes distressed
• The caregiver returns and the stranger leaves
• After the child starts to play, caregiver leaves and child is left completely alone
• Stranger returns and tries to interest the child in a toy or offer comfort if the child is distressed
• Cargiver returns and stranger leaves

• Separation anxiety - The child shows anxiety on separation from the caregiver, easily soothed
• Willingness to explore - The child explores more when the caregiver is present, and returns to the caregiver as a safe base
• Stranger anxiety - The child shows distress at a stranger
• Behaviour on reunion - The child is pleased to see caregiver

Attachment types

• Secure - 66%. Show moderate proximity seeking, explore but regulalry go back to caregiver, show moderate stranger anxiety, show moderate separation anxiety
• Insecure-avoidant - 22%. Do not seek proximity, do not show secure base behaviour, show little stranger anxiety, show little separation anxiety
• Insecure-resistant - 12%. Greater proximity, secure base, explore less, huge stranger anxiety, show great separation anxiety

Strengths

• Standardised procedure was used to easy to replicate
• Study simulated research into attachment and factors that influence development of different attachment types

Limitations

• It was a labatory experiment; means the situation was artifical and may lack mundane realism
• Study was conducted on 100 middle-class American mothers. Not applicable to general population
• Results are not supproted in other cultures. In USA, it was 66% secure, 22% insecure-avoidant and 12% insecure-resistant. In Germany, it was 57% secure, 35% insecure-avoidant and 8% insecure-resistant. Study does not have cross-cultural replication

• Collected results of studies of attachment types using Strange Situation from different countries
• Conucted a meta-analysis, where studies were collected together and compared

Country              No.of studies             Secure              Insecure-avoidant         Insecure-resistant

Germany                    3                        56.6%                        35.3%                                 8.1%      

Great Britain               1                          75                             22.2                                     2.8

Sweden                      1                         74.5                           21.6                                     3.9

Israel                          2                         64.4                            6.8                                      28.8

Japan                         2                         67.7                            5.2                                       25

China                         1                           50                              25                                        25

Overall average                                      65                             21.3                                      17

Strengths

• More in-depth questions were raised where more insecure attachment types were found in the same cultures, showing importance of cultural influences
• Fact that more similiarities than differences were found across cultures is a positive factor

Limitations

• Studies were limited; over half came from the USA, so results can't be generalised
• Strange situation was designed for American children/mothers, reflecting US culture and practices
• Soem countries only privided one study, which may not be a representative sample

Procedure

• 88 children were referred to Bowlby's clinic and 44 of them were reported to be 'thieves'
• On arrival at the clinic, each child had their IQ tested by a psychologist who also assessed the child’s emotional attitudes towards the tests.
• At the same time a social worker interviewed a parent to record details of the child’s early life
• The psychologist and social worker made separate reports

Findings

• More than half of the juvenile thieves had been separated from their mothers for longer than six months during their first five years. In the control group only two had had such a separation.
• 32% showed 'affectionless psychopathy'. None of the control group were affectionless psychopaths. From this number, 86% experienced early and prolonged separation from their mothers, where as in the control group of the same number only 4% had experienced situation

Conclusion = Bowlby concluded that maternal deprivation in the child's early life caused permanent emotional damage. He diagnosed it as a condition and called it affectionless psycopathy

Strengths

• Bowlby's work stimulated research into the care of children and changed attitudes

Limitations

• As the research was correlational, cause and effect cannot be implied between early separations and later behavioural problems
• Information was collected retrospectively and could well be inaccurate
• No distinction was made between deprivation and privation
• Rutter (1978) argued that problems were not solely due to the lack of attachment due to factors like lack of intellectual stimulation

Aim

• To investigate whether good quality care after adoption can make up for very poor early institutional experiences

Procedure

• 165 Romanian orphans were adopted into British families. Rutter wanted to see if good care could compensate for the poor earlier experiences the child suffered
• Natural experiment with age of adoption being the naturally occurring independent variable
• Longitudinal study with same participants used over a 13 year period
• Rutter assessed the physical, cognitive and emotional development at ages 4,6,11 and 15
• British children adopted at the same age served as a control group

Findings

• Children have a higher average IQ score if they were adopted at a younger age compared to those adopted later on
• Rutter found evidence of disinhibited attachment. This was equally friendly and affectionate behaviour towards all people
• Disinhibited attachment was extremely rare in UK-born adoptees and children who were adopted at a younger age. Children who spent longer in institutions are more likely to display signs of disinhibited attachment

Conclusions

• Effects of early deprivation do not seem completely irreversible
• Children exposed to institutions are more likely to make a fuller recovery if adopted into a caring environment at an early age
• Rutter suggested that Bowlby’s ‘critical period’ could be described as a ‘sensitive period’. This means that although there is an optimal period for forming attachment, it is not impossible to form them after the age of 2 and a half

Strengths

• Longitudinal study; prevented individual differences between participants assessing same children over time
• The study involved real pps, results have more real life applications

Limitations

• Uses opportunity sampling so pps may not be representative of how care would affect people
• Natural experiment; lacks of control over variables

Procedure

• 95 children aged 12-31 months who had spent most of their lives in institutional care were compared to a control group of 50 children who had never lived in an institution
• Attachment type was measured by using the strange situation
• Carers also asked about unusual social behaviour including attention-seeking behaviour

Findings

• 74% of control group were securely attached in the strange situation
• Only 19% of institutional group were securely attached
• 65% of institutional group were classed with disorganised attachment. 44% of this group had disinhibited attachment

Conclusions

• Effects of living in an institution are long lasting
• Lack of an early close relationship with one particular person could contribute to formation of non-secure type attachment and then later social and emotional problems

Procedure:

• They analysed 620 replies to a ‘love quiz’ printed in an American local newspaper
• The quiz had 3 sections
• The first assessed respondents’ current or most relationship
• The second part assessed general love experiences such as number if partners
• Third section assessed attachment type by asking respondents to choose which of 3 statements best described their feelings

Findings:

• 56% of respondents were identified as securely attached with 25% insecure-avoidant and 19% insecure-resistant
• Those reporting secure attachment were the most likely to have and good longer lasting romantic experiences
• The avoid-resistant tended to reveal jealousy and fear of intimacy
• These findings sugggest that patterns of attachment behaviour are reflected in romantic relationships

Strengths:

• A replication of this method using 108 undergraduate students provided similar findings

Limitations

• Used self-report measures; participants likely to produce results that show them in a favourable light
• They found a correlation between the factors, attachment formed might not be a cause
• Studies using longitudinal studies have produced mixed results. Zimmerman et al found that childhood attachment type was not a good predictor of attachments in adolescence, and that life events often altered secure attachments to an insecure type in adulthood.

• Looked at 99 mothers
• They measured their infant's attachment style using strange situation and assessed their attachment style as child using interviews
• Concluded that early attachment style of mother is passed on to their children and then subsequently to future generations

• Lucassen (2011) = More secure attachments found in children with sensitive factors
• Belsky (2009) = High levels of marital intimacy related to secure father-infant attachments
• Brown (2010) = High levels of supportive co-parenting related to secure father-infant attachments
• Children without fathers often do less well at school and show high levels of risk-taking and aggression. Suggests that fathers can help prevent negative developmental outcomes

• One explanation of attachment was proposed by Dollard and Miller in 1950. Suggested that attachment is a set of learned behaviours, it is not natural. They also state the basis of the learning of this attachment is the provision of food; an infant will form an to whoever feeds them. Consequently, because it is usually the mother who is the provider of the food to the baby, then the baby tends to form a stronger attachment with the mother.
• Classical conditioning. Classical conditioning involves learning to associate two stimuli together so we respond to one in the same way as we would respond to the other. This explains attachment to the mother because the attachment is formed as infants associate their primary caregiver with food, meaning that they associate their primary caregiver with pleasure. Thus, babies want to stay attached to their primary caregiver.
• Operant conditioning. Operant conditioning is learning to repeat behaviour or not, depending on the consequences. This explains why babies cry for comfort, because crying leads to a response from the caregiver. This is an example of positive reinforcement. Negative reinforcement occurs when trying to escape from something unpleasant. Operant conditioning suggests that babies form attachments based on the consequences of their behaviour.