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What is attachment? How does it relate to developmental psychology? What are the different types of attachment? These are just some of the questions to which we seek answers in this topic.
Developmental psychology is a branch of psychology that studies a person's growth and changes during their lifetime. The study examines behaviours, feelings and thought processes intending to understand how and why they develop over time.
Developmental influences that affect our behaviour and thinking can include:
Biological, such as genetic dispositions.
Cognitive, such as intelligence.
Sociocultural or environmental, such as through parenting styles and cultural factors.
Much of our development occurs during the early stages of our lives; due to this, the focus of developmental psychology is often on childhood and adolescence. An important aspect of such life stages is studying attachment behaviour.
We will specifically be studying attachment within developmental psychology.
Developmental psychology studies include studying children's developmental stages, Shikha Shah - StudySmarter Originals
Attachment is the name given to an emotional bond or ties felt towards another person. The bond provides feelings of security and closeness. In infant-parent relationships, attachment is a two-way emotional bond in which both people are contributors. Through reciprocal interactions, the attachment between an infant and its parent is strengthened.
Attachment can also be studied through an individual's reaction to separation from someone with whom they are attached.
Psychologist John Bowlby (1969) defined attachment as a:
Lasting psychological connectedness between human beings.
The focus of the attachment study, as mentioned above, will be on early childhood and adolescence. In the chapter of attachment, you will find the following subtopics.
This subtopic is about caregiver-infant attachment. We will study attachment figures and the role of the father. We will also study the stages of attachment as found by Schaffer and Emerson (1964) and reciprocity and interactional synchrony as studied by Condon & Sander (1974).
This subtopic is about the animal studies of attachment and Lorenz' and Harlow's research. We will start by discussing the role of animal studies in psychology and how they help us understand attachment. We will move on to consider both studies individually and evaluate them.
This subtopic is about explanations of attachment. We will study several explanations of attachment, including the Learning Theory, Bowlby's Monotropic Theory (1969) and the types of attachment found in Ainsworth's ‘Strange Situation’ procedure.
This subtopic is about the cultural variations in attachment. We will start by defining cultural variations and explain how they work with regard to attachment. We will illustrate this by considering Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg's 1988 study in more detail. We will look at the findings of the study and its implications. Lastly, we will evaluate the study.
This subtopic is about deprivation, privation and separation. We will study Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation to learn about the effects of deprivation on attachment
.
This topic is about the effects of institutionalization and deprivation on attachment. We will look at the Romanian orphan studies in detail to understand more about the effects.
This subtopic is about attachment and later relationships in a person's life. We will be studying the ‘romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process’ research by Hazan & Shaver (1987).
Attachment is an emotional bond or ties felt towards another person. It also exists mutually, such as between an infant and its parent.
Attachment is studied as part of developmental psychology. This topic will cover several different aspects of attachment.
Secure attachment is a style of attachment described by Mary Ainsworth, in 1978, through the Strange Situation procedure. A secure attachment is when a child has a carer who is emotionally available, sensitive and supportive; this means that the child has a positive working model of itself.
Ambivalent attachment is a style of attachment described by Mary Ainsworth, in 1978, through the Strange Situation procedure. It is a form of insecure-resistant attachment and can be formed when the child does not have a consistent response from its carer. This can result in the child having anxiety about having its needs met and having a negative working model of itself.
The different types of attachment characterised by Mary Ainsworth in 1978 are secure, insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant.
Attachment is the name given to an emotional bond or tie felt towards another person. The bond or tie provides feelings of security and closeness. In infant-parent relationships, attachment is a two-way emotional bond in which both people are contributors. Through reciprocal interactions, the attachment between an infant and its parent is strengthened.
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