Attachment
General Links:
Link to buy educational CD's: http://www.davidsonfilms.com/package-deals?zenid=91l1immdm2rme538h447it10a1
- Konrad Lorenz (ethology) : “Critical periods & imprinting”
- John Bowlby : / attachment behavior : sucking, clinging, following, crying,
(International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 1958, 39, 350-373, “The nature of the child tie to his mother” Bowlby, J)
- Micheal Rutter : Bowlby's erstwhile critic (Maternal deprivation reassessed , Harmondsworth, M.Rutter, England : Penguin, 1972) : Imprinting is NOT irreversible. Rutter has done extensive research on this and much more and is currently investigating Dynamic Models of behavior
- Mary Ainsworths experimental paradigm : “The Strange Situation”
ref : Ainsworth, M.D.S., Blehar, M.C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: A psychological study of the strange situation.
Ainsworth, M., & Bowlby, J. (1991). An ethological approach to personality development. American Psychologist, 46(4), 333 – 341
- Harlows Experiments
Attachment theory
Think about :
1. Individual Differences in attachment behaviors :
The Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children began in 1975 and is currently in its 33rd year, AND, you ought to have read it, if not, its not too late : Alan Sroufe and colleagues followed a high-risk sample of children
Blasphemously summarized : Several measures of early experience (go read the paper to see the 200 odd. measures), including attachment, predict the possibility of risks of various behavioral problems during the preschool, middle childhood and adolescent years of children born to teenage mothers.
More detailed :
Avoident attachment in infancy related to aggression in middle childhood, aggression and antisocial behavior in adolescence
Ambivalent attachment in infancy related to anxiety disorders (after controlling for maternal anxiety and child temperament) and depressive symptoms in adolescence
Secure attachment in infancy related to later resiliency, greater social competence and more adaptive reaction to stressors during adolescence (protective factor)
Conclusion : Recipe for disaster = Insecure attachment + family adversity Later psychological difficulties / psychopathology But but but, if a vulnerable child experiences a corrective attachment experience, he/she is able to revise his/her working model of attachment
Conceptual Peg to help you remember how unstable life can get: Watch MTV's 16 and pregnant episodes
Importance in history-taking and therapy
History taking : Attachment (Easy-going, Slow-to-Warm, Difficult Temperaments and secure/Insecure avoidant/ Insecure resistant or ambivalent)
We are assessing socialization processes and these above assessments help in predicting future pathology (risk).
Externalizing and Internalizing behaviors, self-esteem predicted from infant attachment behaviors
(Meta analysis with effect size range : 0.17 to 0.54 with a mean of 0.29 ; ref - Van Ijzendoorn, Schuengel, & Bakermans-Kranenburg, 1999)
Therapy (with case illustrations) : The Role of Attachment Functions in Psychotherapy, Jeremy Spiegel, Sally K. Severino, Nancy K. Morrison, The Journal of Psychotherapy Practice and Research 2000; 9:25–32
Attachment theory in adult psychiatry. Part 1: Conceptualizations, measurement and clinical research findings Advances in Psychiatric Treatment (2006) 12: 440-449
Attachment theory in adult psychiatry. Part 2: Importance to the therapeutic relationship
Advances in Psychiatric Treatment (2007) 13: 10-16.
Link : Attachment, Love and Flourishing relationships : http://www.sagepub.com/upm-data/11233_Chapter_13.pdf
2. Methodologies for assessing the working models of attachment
Important to assess adults in relation to their earlier attachments.
Important research : Main & Goldwyn, 1998 for an empirical study (which are usually hard to find on this topic) of associations between attachment representations and later psychopathology in adolescence and adulthood, differential responses of individuals to supportive interventions, and the inter-generational transmission of resilience and vulnerability to stress.
Classify people as :
a. Avoident dismissing
b. Ambivalent-preoccupied
c. Unresolved/Disoriented
These classifications help predict psychopathology
What are the best pathologies to study attachment ?
Especially one's in which they have inter-personal problems such as Personality Disorders (B.P.D/A.S.P.D), Partner violence, Dissociation, Suicidal behaviors
Tools you may want to use to assess adult attachment : The Adult attachment interview
3. Investigations of Attachment representations in children
Using Picture Response Procedures (adapted from Hansberg's Separation Anxiety Test – Klagsbrun-Bowlby modification)
4. Contribution of attachment theory in explaining the inter-generational transmission of risk and resiliency
- This is a 'hot' topic for research. Must google 'inter-generational transmission' and read about parental transmission of vulnerability to psychopathology and resilience.
- “Transmission gap” a word coined to indicate : A gap in our knowledge of the processes by which a mothers own attachment experience influences her infants attachment security.
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