Attachment- Cultural Variation

Cultural variation is the difference in norms and values between people in different groups. In attachment, it is the difference in the proportion of children of different attachment types.

Key studies:

Van IJzendoorn and Kroonenberg:

A: To investigate proportion of secure, insecure avoidant and insecure resistant attachments in different counrties, and the differences within the same countries to get an idea of cultural variation.

P: Researchers located 32 attachment studies used the strage situation to investigate the proportions of infants with different attachment types. These studies were conducted in 8 countries- (15 in the USA). Overall, the 32 studies produced results for 1,990 children and the data were meta analysed, results were combined and weighted for sample size.

F: There was a wide variation between the proportions of attachment types in different studies. Secure base attachment was most common in all the countries; proportions varied from 75% in Britain to 50% in China. Insecure resistant was the least common in overall; proportions varied from 3% in Britain to 30% in Israel. Insecure avoidant was common in Germany and least common in Japan. Variation between results of studies in the same country were 150% greater than those between countries. USA- one study found 46% secure attachment but another in USA found 90%.

Simonella et al's aim was to see whether the proportion of babies of different attachment types in Italy still matches those in previous studies. Sample: 76 12 month babies using Strange Situation.…