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Cultural variations in attachment - Coggle Diagram
Cultural variations in attachment
Belsky (1999)
Bowlby's theory suggest that secure attachments should dominate in all cultures, with equal amounts of insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant.
Belsky has proposed an evolutionary explanation for the existence of similar attachment types in different cultures.
Belsky proposes that insecure attachment types are associated with weak adult relationships and early sexual activity, which could be useful in circumstances such as famine where the need for rapid reproduction arises.
Child-rearing impact
If different patterns of attachment types are found across cultures, it would indicate that attachment types are learned and not biological.
This would mean that attachment types are learned through exposure to different cross-cultural child rearing practices.
Child rearing styles vary across cultures - for example, who has the primary responsibility for child care or the age at which which a baby is expected to be parted from the primary caregiver.
Social attitudes
There are also cross-cultural differences in how attachment styles are viewed.
For example, in Britain, insecure avoidant attachment is seen negatively. In Germany, where independence is valued more highly, it is viewed more positively.
These different social attitudes towards attachment styles helps to explain why German infants are more likely to be classified as insecure-avoidant than British infants.
Mi-Kyoung (2005)
Mi-Kyoung used the Strange Situation to compare 87 Korean and 113 American families.
Korean infants did not stay close to their mothers and when their mothers returned, they were more likely to play with their infants.
The proportion of securely attached infants was similar in both cultures. This indicates that different child rearing practices could lead to secure attachment.
Malin (1997)
Malin observed Australian aboriginal infants who are discouraged from exploring because of the threats and distractions of food. So they tend to stay close to their mothers, and use them as secure bases.
Because of the differences in Australian aboriginal child-rearing practices, these infant were incorrectly labelled as insecurely attached and many were placed in care.
Evaluation
Findings from the Strange Situation procedure reflects cultural values and practices rather than identifying the 'right' kind of attachment.
Rogoff (2003) found that because black American infants are encouraged to be friendly to strangers, the Strange Situation procedure activates their instincts to explore. This indicates that the strange situation procedure has different meaning for different cultures.