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Psychology - Attachment (Animal Studies of Attachment: Harlow's…
Psychology - Attachment
Caregiver-Infant Interactions: It's said the interaction between infant and caregiver are important in the child's social development.
Reciprocity: How two people react. Mother and child respond to each other which elicits a response from each. From around 3 months, this interaction will increase in its frequency and involved close attention to each other's verbal signs and facial expressions.
Interactional Synchrony: Mother and infant reflect both their actions and emotions in a synschronised way. This takes place when mother infant interact and their actions and emotions mirror each other. Research found that high levels of synchrony associated with a better quality of mother-infant attachment.
(-)EVALUATION: Observing the infants is difficult because the hand movements and changes in expression is unclear to know from the infant's perspective. Is the infant's imitation conscious and deliberate or is it innate and unconscious? This makes it hard to draw a certain conclusion in parent-infant interactions as it could have an alternative meaning.
(+)EVALUATION: Controlled observations capturing the interactions on camera of the infant and caregiver means we can pay close attention repeatedly. It's good in validity because the infant doesn't care about being filmed so the behaviour is natural.
(-/+)EVALUATION: It's been pointed out that synchrony is behaviour occurring at the same time with no purpose or reason for it. However, it's helpful when looking at the development of mother-infant as well as being helpful in stress responses, empathy, language and moral development.
Attachment Figures:
Parent-Infant Attachment: Schaffer & Emerson found infants forming an attachment with their mothers at around 7 months and 75% formed secondary attachments, including the father, at 18 months.
The Role of the Father: A longitudinal study was conducted observe the parents' behaviour and its relationship in the quality of attachment with the children up until they were teens. Findings shows that fathers play a different role in attachment that is concerned more with play and stimulation rather than nurturing.
Fathers as Primary Carers: There's evidence to suggest that father who become the main caregiver, adopt behaviour that are more typically displayed in mothers. They spend more time smiling, imitating and holding infants and this behaviour appears to be very important when forming a attachment with the infant. This shows father can be more nurturing and draws a key understanding that in order to form an attachment, it's the level of responsiveness rather than the gender of the parent.
(-)EVALUATION: There is inconsistent findings in relation to the role of the father. Some psychologists are concerned with the father as being a primary attachment whereas others focus on the father being a secondary attachment figure in the infant's development.
(-)EVALUATION: Grossman found that fathers as secondary attachment figures have an important role in a child's development. However, other research have found children with same sex couples do not differ from those who have a father and a mother which suggests secondary attachment isn't important and neither does the gender of the caregiver.
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