pre-attachment
newborns prefer social stimuli, cry to summon caregivers
attachment in the making
6 weeks: begin to show social smiles, but still no specific attachment
- whoever meets their needs
- begin to trust that someone will respond to their needs (or not)
clear-cut attachment
6 months: attached to specific individuals- happier with them, smile more at them
reciprocal relationships
1.5 years on: mutually-regulated reciprocal relationships, less separation anxiety
learning theory approaches
behaviorist: how does environment provide positive and negative reinforcements for behavior?
- eating is rewarding, mom is associated with that reward and so positively reinforced —> infants attach to mom
- food is paramount: importance of feeding schedules, reinforcement strategies, age at weaning, etc
- here, attachment squarely on parents shoulders
- attachment failures related to all things parents do wrong (not responding to its needs)
criticism of learning theory approach
- surely there is more to attachment than who feeds you
- no account of children’s interpretations/ thoughts of relationship
- children become attached to bad/ neglectful parents
evidence against learning theory
Renee spitz: orphanage v. prison studies
- compared sterile (but physically supportive) orphanages to prison nurseries
- after 4 mos, babies in orphanages (NOT in prisons):
- movement diminished: lay in one place
- vacant, expressionless faces
- infants unstable and hyper-fearful: sudden dramatic clinging, biting
- stereotyped motor behaviors (rocking, banging heads against crib, thumb sucking)
spitz biggest finding
- 37% of orphanages babies did not survive past second bday
- zero prison babies died
- babies in a dirty and malnourished situation survived
anna freud and sophie dann: concentration camp children
- group of 6 infants separated from parents in concentrations camps; no stable adult figure, essentially raised each other
- discovered at age 3
- initially quite hostile toward adults, but lovely to each other: shared, took turns
- fared better than orphanage children (with no relationships); became relatively normal adults
- peer relationships may help in atypical attachment situations
harlow: critical period for bond formation
monkeys chose loving mother (cloth) over wire mother
- monkeys turned out atypically, especially if no cloth mother
- lacked social skills, abused their own offspring
- cloth mother infants were able to use mother a secure base from which to explore, but not typical
- orphanage reared children also atypical
- recall international adoption studies: age at adoption matters
john bowlby: ethological approach to bonding
- Bowlby proposed that children are biologically pre-programmed to form attachments with caregivers because this helps them survive
- monotropy: one attachment is the most important
- biological/ evolutionary perspective
- bonding (not just eating) made our predecessors more successful
- konrad lorenz: birds imprint on caregiver
- human attachment behaviors: crying, smiling, clinging
internal working models
- not just attachment behaviors
- early attachment relationships lead infants to develop mental representations fo the self, of attachment figures, and of relationships in general
- guides relationships throughout life
attachment behaviors
- smiling: smiling feedback loops
- clinging: probably was once as common in human primates
the strange situation
- major distress expected from 11-15 mos or so
- by 17 mos, more ok if mom leaves
4 attachment styles
- securely attached
- insecure-avoidant
- insecure-ambivalent
- disorganized-disoriented
secure attachment
- use mother as secure base from which to explore
- mostly OK with strangers when mom is in room
- very upset when mom leaves
- easily comforted upon return
- 60% fo Canadian babies
insecure-avoidant attachment
- explore no problem (doesn’t seem like using mom as secure base)
- fine with strangers
- might not care that mom leaves
- avoidance of mom when she returns
- 15% Canadian babies
insecure-ambivalent/ resistant
- less prone to explore- seem clingy
- always uncomfortable around strangers
- extremely upset when mom leaves
- inconsolable (even by her) when se returns
- 10% of Canadian babies
disorganized- disoriented attachment
- babies who are very inconsistent in their reactions
- sometimes dazed/ disoriented
- sometimes fearful
- linked to later aggression issues and psychopathology
- more likely to have been abused
- 15% Canadian babies
continuity of styles
- securely attached infants are more sociable 3 year old
- better at understanding others emotions, more prosocial, empathetic
- better at handling stress
- predicts relationship with mother in adulthood
- predicts friend/ romantic relationship styles in adulthood
- predicts academic success
why do attachment styles differ?
- nature: the child themselves
- nurture: parenting styles, culture
sensitive/ insensitive parents
- parental sensitivity: consistently responsive caregiving- in timing and in kind
- Infants of insensitive mothers have just 38% rate of secure attachment (v 60%)
- babies of adolescent mother are more likely to be disorganized
- Relationships observed in > 26 cultures
- Hard to determine causality but:
- Children can have diff styles with diff parents
- Twin studies suggest most attachment variation due to environment, not genes
- Parents in sensitivity training interventions have more securely attached, less disorganized children
- Children can have diff styles with diff parents
Internal working models
- Perhaps continuity result of developing a mode of how relationship go- people will treat me/each other like X
- Formed early on, effects interpretation of future ones
- Recent evidence in babies for this: securely attached babies expect other moms to return, insecurely ones expect them to leave
Sleep training price et al., 2012
- Randomized trial where infants were randomly assigned to sleep training ro usual care
- 5 yrs late, no diff in attachment styles between children who were asleep trained versus not
- Parents and health professional can confidently use these techniques to reduce the short- to medium term burden of infants sleep problems and maternal depression
