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ATTACHMENT- Ainsworth's 'strange situation'. - Coggle Diagram
ATTACHMENT- Ainsworth's 'strange situation'.
Mary Ainsworth's strange situation observational study (1970)
Strength of attachment: observed ugandan and american mothers and identified a range of behaviours that indicated attachment strength. These included: proximity to mother, secure base, stranger anxiety, separation anxiety, reunion response and sensitive responsiveness of the mother to infants needs.
her study is a key piece of evaluative research on attachment
infants (12-18 m/o) and their mothers participated in a structured observation in a controlled lab setting containing chairs and toys. procedure has a number of stages of 3 minutes each. infants responses recorded at each stage for later analysis
both enter room and infant can explore. 2. stranger enters room, sits and talks to mum then attempts to interact with infant. 3. mother leaves room and infant is alone with stranger. 4. mother returns and stranger leaves. 5. mother leaves infant alone in room. 6. stranger returns and interacts with infant. 7. mother returns and stranger leaves
the observation allows the researchers to assess the infants willingness to use mum as a safe base and explore the environment (1,4), assess separation anxiety from mum (3,5), assess reunion response (4,7), assess stranger anxiety (2,3,6)
findings provided evidence for 3 dtstinct attachment types- insecure avoidant, secure and insecure resistant. these types seemed to corrolate with the level of sensitive responsiveness of the parents
all suggests that secure attachment develops due to the attention of a consistently sensitive and responsive mother
ATTACHMENT TYPES
infants categorised into 1/3 based on the observed behaviours
TYPE A- INSECURE AVOIDANT- keeps distance from mother, doesnt use her as secure base and explores freely. low stranger and separation anxiety. dont attempt to get comfort from mum when she returns. mothers show little sensitive responsiveness
TYPE B- SECURE (ideal type according to Ainsworth). uses mother as safe base to explore environment. high stranger and separation anxiety but happy reuion response allows them to quickly settle back to exploration
TYPE C- INSECURE RESISTANT- wont explore environment and are inconsistent about wanting closeness/distance from mum. high stranger and separation anxiety, but unable to settle when reunited with mum- rejecting her attention. mothers appear inconsistent with their sensitive responsiveness.
evaluation
POSITIVE- highly controlled observational research study with clear standardised procedure and behavioural categories it can and has been replicated amongst different cultural groups, enhancing its findings generalisability
POSITIVE- well respected and standard diagnostic tool used to measure the strength and type of relationship between infants and their mothers.
NEGATIVE- differences in the way children are raised accross cultures means the mathodology used and the drawing of conclusions from the results may not be appropriate for all populations. Van Ijendoorn and Kroonenberg showed more insecure-avoidant in germany and insecure-resistant in japan but this could explain germans valuing independent children and especially close relationshio between infant and mothers in japan
NEGATIVE- observations only a snapshot of behaviour, not taking into considerations wider factors like the relationship with other family members, or their behaviour in familar developments
NEGATIVE- "insecure" labels contain value judgement, that these relationships are worse than "secure" types. this approach labels entire cultures as defective, also critisised mothers who could struggle with life demands creating other attachment types. that makes this research socially senitive