Why have psychologists stressed the importance of attachment behaviours in
development? Many theorists agree that social contact early in a child’s life is
important for healthy personality development. This is the most important
relationship of the child development period as it is from this that the child
drives its confidence in the world. A break from this relationship is
experienced as highly distressing and constitutes a considerable trauma
(Schaffer 1964). Through frequent social and emotional exchanges with parents
the infant not only defines itself, but also acquires a particular style and
orientation that some researchers believe is carried over into later life (Sroufe
1978). Therefore, the relationship between an infant and its caregiver and its
development is one that has generated much interest to developmental
psychologists. John Bowlby (1958, 1968) put forward a comprehensive account of
attachment and believed that the infant and mother instinctively trigger each
other’s behaviour to form an attachment bond. Attachment can therefore be
defined as ‘ the ability to form focused, permanent and emotionally meaningful
relationships with specific others’ (Butterworth & Harris 1994). In child
psychology, attachment is often restricted to a relationship between particular
social figures and to a particular phenomenon thought to reflect unique
characteristics of the relationship ( Santrock & Bartlett 1986). This essay
will attempt to examine the role and importance of attachment behaviours in
development. In Bowlby’s view, there is a dyadic emotional regulation between
the infant and the mother or caregiver. The infant has innate signals to elicit
responses from the caregiver. Conversely, infant behaviour such as crying,
cooing, smiling etc are elicited by the caregivers specific actions e.g. leaving
the room or putting the infant down. Santrock and Bartlett (1986) found that’the infant’s behaviour is directed by the primary goal of maintaining the
mother’s proximity. The baby processes information about the mother’s location
and changes his behaviour based on this fact. Thus┘instinct or a fixed
pattern is the primary force for developmental change, but is transformed
through social experience.’ This reciprocal tie of mother and infant is a state
that ensures care and protection during the most vulnerable period of
development. This attachment to the mother has a clear biological survival
value, explaining the significance of the mother-infant interaction within the
overall framework of attachment behaviour. Sroufe (1991) supports this view, he
maintains that attachment refers to a behavioural system, which is ‘selected for
its effect on the reproductive success of individuals in the environment in
which they evolved.’ Bowlby argued that different attachment behaviours, such as
crying, following etc, are functionally related, in that all may lead to the
same outcome – the caregiver-infant proximity (Sroufe 1991). Bowlby argues that
attachment, is therefore a primary process, which is innate, and is mediated by
social interchange. Here the visual channel plays an important role, i.e.
through smiling and eye to eye contacts. Bowlby outlined four phases of the
development of attachment as an integrated system of behaviours in infants:
Phase 1:- Birth – 2/3 months The infant directs his attachment to human figures
on an instinctual bias; all are equally likely to elicit smiling or crying
because the infant is not discriminating. Phase 2:- 3-6 months The infant’s
attachment focuses on one figure, typically the primary caregiver. Phase 3:- 6-9
months The intensity of attachment to the mother or caregiver increases. Due to
this and newly acquired motor skills, the infant now readily seeks the proximity
to the caregiver. Phase 4:- 9-12 months The elements of attachment listed above
become integrated into a mutual system of attachment to which both infant and
mother contribute. Bowlby argued that communication between the infant and the
caregiver takes the form of non verbal communication, this can be eye to eye
contact, or face to face interaction. He went on to propose that the baby’s
smile is the essential catalyst that generates the infant-caregiver interaction.
The interaction goes through positive feedback on both sides until it becomes a
conversation of visually perceived gestures. Wright (1991) outlines the progress
of this progression of ‘smiling’ in the development of attachment behaviours:
Begins at birth: At first the smile is fleeting and incomplete. 4-5 weeks: The
smile is now nearly complete and the trigger for the smile becomes more
specific. 5-6 weeks: The smile response is now fully formed. 6-10 weeks: The
mother/caregivers face evokes a more immediate and generous smile than any other
does. 2-3 months: The smile response to the mothers/ caregivers and other
familiars becomes more dominant; with responses to strangers becoming weaker. 8
months onwards: The specificity of response becomes firmly established;
strangers are responded to quite differently from familiar faces, and the
mother/ caregivers face evokes the strongest response of all. Experiments
confirm that after the fifth week happy visual interactions elicit a smile
response from a baby. In weeks 6 to 12 the baby is learning the characteristics
of human faces by tracking the face, the hairline etc. The child will also grin
when eye contact is finally made. Studies support the view that the eyes are the
most important part of the ‘visual gestalt’ that elicits a smile (Wright 1991).
Therefore, the mother’s face and the baby’s smile are the central features of
the playful interaction that is basic to the attachment process. The baby’s
responses become increasingly directed and specific; the mother’s pleasure in
and responsiveness to her baby increase as she feels that her baby recognises
her. ‘Here is a conversation without words, a smiling between faces, at the
heart of human development.’ (Wright 1991) Findings from animal studies of
behaviour influenced Bowlby ideas. Harlow and Zimmerman (1959) conducted an
experiment that proved that attachment was not based on the supply of food
involving infant monkeys. The infant monkeys were placed in a cage with two,
wire mesh, surrogate monkey mothers. One was covered with terrycloth fabric
while the other was left as it was. The infant monkeys were fed from the wire
mother. The hypothesis was that if the main cause for attachment was food then
one would expect that the monkeys would cling to the wire monkey which supplied
milk. In actual fact, the monkeys preferred to spend their time between feedings
close to or clinging to the cloth mother. They would also jump on this when
frightened. Harlow’s studies demonstrate the importance of physical contact for
the attachment bond. Other interesting findings from this experiment were that
the baby’s raised from birth in the laboratory did not establish healthy social
behaviours. They did not engage in typical mating behaviour, and mother monkeys
proved to be neglectful and abusive towards their offspring, not cuddling or
feeding their young. Harlow attributed this disruptive behaviour to the lack of
social contact with other monkeys during development (Brodzinsky,Gormly &
Ambron 1979). Schaffer and Emerson (1964) conducted an influential study which
looked at sixty children every month for their first twelve months, and showed
that reinforcement from feeding was not able to account for attachment of
infants to some people. Findings showed that the infants formed multiple
attachments with parents, grandparents and siblings, and also those who did
actually took little or no care of the infants basic needs. Instead attachments
were formed with individuals who were prepared to play, be responsible and
interact socially with the child. Based on such studies, Bowlby’s reasoning was
that the biological need for security has resulted in infants possessing a
number of attachment behaviours, e.g. crying, following proximity seeking etc,
and that these behaviours are used to achieve the goal of a feeling of security,
when infants feel insecure they will produce these behaviours. Bowlby greatly
influenced the way researchers thought about attachment. There then followed the
need for some sort of measurement of attachment behaviour. Mary Ainsworth (1971)
developed Bowlby’s ideas and elaborated on the phases to include other social
behaviours, and the use of the attachment figure as a secure base. The ‘strange
situation’ was designed to measure the quality of attachment between mothers and
their infants. The procedure involved observing the infants reactions to a
stranger when in the presence of the mother, when alone with the stranger, then
in the third phase, reunited with the mother. Three characteristics patterns
were observed: (i)Group B – Secure Attachment relationships: These children use
the mother as a base of security in a strange situation, and while the mother is
present are content to explore and also react positively to strangers. However,
when the mother leaves the room, they may or may not show distress, also in the
occasion of being alone with a stranger. Upon the mothers return, securely
attached babies generally make contact with their mothers, either by looking at
them or, in the case of those who have experienced distress, by seeking contact
and comfort from her. The hallmark of these children is that they use their
attachment figures to regain their source of security when stressed. This then
allows them to move freely through the world again through exploration and play.
Most of the babies tested by Ainsworth displayed this kind of behaviour. (ii)
Group C: Resistant insecurely attached relationships: These children are more
likely to seem anxious or distressed and in need of contact even when the mother
is in the room. This type of infant has trouble using the mother as a secure
base for exploration. Upon reunion with the mother after separation, the infant
may, while seeking contact with her may actively resist her efforts to comfort
them. (iii) Group A: Avoidant insecurely attached relationships: The children of
this group separate readily to play, and do not particularly seek to be close to
their mother when alone with her. They are also not particularly distressed when
left alone with a stranger. Most significantly, on reunion with their mother
they show no more than a casual greeting and may ignore, or pointedly look away
from turn away from, or move away from the caregiver. They do not initiate
action and are not responsive to the mothers attempts at interaction (Sroufe
1995). This situation of being left alone, and then being reunited with the
caregiver can be categorised into these three categories. An explanation of this
is that with prolonged separation, the emotional upheaval is so great that the
infants behavioural structure is disorganised, and cannot be put back together
immediately. ‘In clinical terms, one could speak of the infant as at first
defending against the possibility of renewed pain and vulnerability by not
acknowledging the presence of the caregiver.’ (Sroufe 1995) All in all the
different patterns of attachment have complex causes. They are thought to
develop as a response to different styles of mothering and as a consequence of
the temperamental characteristics of the child. However, the classification may
vary from culture to culture and the same baby may show different patterns
depending on whether parents or siblings accompany the baby in the test. The
practical importance of attachment research can be seen in the areas of
hospitalisation, and re homing orphaned or foster children. The knowledge gained
from these tests should help policy makers deal with these issues with
sensitivity. Hospitalisation of infants in particular has benefited from this
research in that caregivers are now allowed to stay in hospital with their
babies or young children. The area of day care facilities have also been
benefited by this research, as it suggests that a brief separation does not
disrupt the healthy attachment bond as it was previously thought to do. However,
if there is already stress in the home environment, the separation and insecure
attachment may have adverse consequences. Longer term consequences of disrupted
attachment are more difficult to establish; but is thought to be reversible, as
children brought up in orphanages become securely attached to their adoptive
parents even as late as 8 years old ( Tizard and Hodges 1978 cited in
Butterworth & Harris 1994). In conclusion, Bowlby’s ideas and research
provided a comprehensive basis for present day approaches to attachment.
Research implies that there are, therefore three main characteristics of
attachment behaviours: Firstly, the infant seeks the closeness and proximity of
the caregiver. Secondly, that the infant shows distress at separation from the
attachment figure and then relief upon reunion, i.e., displays a clear
preference even without physical contact by eye contact or attentiveness to the
sound of the caregivers voice. Thirdly, that the infant uses the attachment
figure as a secure base from which to explore its physical and social
environment (Brodzinsky, Gormly and Ambron 1979). The importance of attachment
in the development of an infant cannot be underestimated, as it is from this
bond that the infant finds comfort security and a base from which to explore
his/her environment safely. Attachment behaviours can be seen as the
manifestation of this need that the infant has, as research suggests that a
break from a meaningful, emotionally charged lasting relationship will produce
highly distressing consequences.
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