Bowlby's Attachment Theory

Mary Ainsworth is known for her ‘Strange Situation’ (Custance 2010) studies with children. Her theory was that the quality of an infant’s attachment depends largely on the kind of attention the infant has received. She observed the attachment styles of children, mostly aged between 12 and 24 months, by placing them in an environment and recording their reactions to their mothers (or primary caregivers) leaving the room and then returning. Based on these observations Ainsworth concluded that there are different types of attachment. Three types of attachment are: ‘anxious-avoidant’, where the child shows little upset with the stranger, but will avoid contact with the parent on their return. The ‘securely attached’ child is one that will show moderate levels of proximity seeking towards the parents and is upset by their departure but deals with the parents return positively, often returning to play. The third type is the ‘anxious-resistant’ child; greatly upset by the parent’s departure and on reunion seems angry and will not be comforted or picked up (Custance 2010).

Ainsworths ‘strange situation’ was developed as a tool to measure types of attachment in infants. The experiment was carried out in a purpose build playroom and children were observed with cameras. It consisted of several situations, standardised for all those who took part. Each condition involved variation of the presence of the mother and/or a stranger, over 3 minute intervals. During these different conditions, the child’s behaviour was monitored, assessing their exploratory behaviour, stranger anxiety, separation protest and reunion behaviour. From her study, Ainsworth identified three types of attachment, these were: secure, insecure- avoidant and insecure-resistant, she

Disorganised-Insecure attachment ( Type D attachments) : Later, researchers Main and Solomn (1986) added a fourth style based upon their own research. These infants displayed a lack of consistent coherent behaviour. They seems apprehensive and confused.

A child will prefer his parent over a stranger. They are there as a safety base for the child to explore. When the parent leaves the room, the child becomes upset, but when they returned, the child returns back to normal and is excited to see the parent. These kinds of children have parents who are always there for the child when it comes to their needs. Avoidant attachment: when the child ignore the parent, doesn’t use the parent as a secure base and isn’t upset when the parent leaves the room.

The first attachment style is secure attachment. The children who were categorized this way showed comfort with stranger as long as the caregiver was there. The children with this type avoided the stranger when the caregiver was not there. The children were distressed when the caregiver left, but not exceedingly distressed. When the caregiver returned, these children acted contented and thrilled.

Anxious-Resistant Insecure Attachment – When the child is left in the room with the stranger they are very unsettled and do not want to carry on exploring or playing in their environment and when their primary caregiver comes to collect the child they may push them away because they have been left with a stranger.

When a child is removed from their home at a young age, the consequences can be more severe. During the ages three and four it is not good for a child to be moved but if they do get moved it is good to have a strong bond with their caregivers. If they get moved repeatedly, it makes their attachment issues more sever. Attachment issues create the following troubles such as; poor eye contact, antisocial, problems with learning and lack of physical affection. Theses are not abnormal for a child with theses issues(“Attachment”). There are two different types of attachment issues and they are the one that babies have which is insecure attachment and for older children it is also called Reactive Attachment Disorder. An infant with this disorder may not smile , or coo or make any sounds , or even does not reach out for you to hold them , they may also reject your affection like trying to soothe

In resistant, anxious, or ambivalent attachments the infant has separation anxiety. In this style, the person is basically not there for you. He or she feels insecure when the mother is not present and this insecurity results from her being inconsistently available, leaving the infant afraid to leave her side (Strong & Cohen, 2014). About 10 percent of infants in our society have anxious or ambivalent attachments. In avoidant attachments the infant senses

From the start of childbirth, children depend on their parent(s) or caregiver(s) to take care of their needs in life (Rodrigue & Reeves, 2015). Four types of attachment to focus on are: secure attachment, insecure-resistant attachment, insecure-avoidant attachment, and insecure-disorganized attachment. Secure attachment refers to when the parent(s) or caregiver(s) are present in the child’s life. Children feel comfortable about being independent to an extent and will interact with new and familiar things on their own in the presence of their caregiver. Separation may cause distress, due to the dependence and attachment to the caregiver. Insecure-avoidant the child does not rely on the care giver for safety and will be precociously independent. They also do relatively well with the caregiver being non present and opened to interacting with strangers. Insecure-resistant attachment the caregiver has the child more focused on their presence and will avoid new experiences even if the caregiver is present. If separation occurs, they become distress and do not cope well even after their return. Finally, insecure-disorganized attachment children show more disoriented or strange behaviors. They will wander with no purpose and show engagement in any activity while being distressed and confused about what they should do or how to interact with or around the

An infant with a secure attachment style has a natural bond with their parent, where they are able to trust them, at the same time leaving their side to discover and explore their surroundings. In an insecure/resistant attachment the relationship the child has with their mother or caregiver is very clingy, thus making them very upset once the caregiver is away. When the mother or caregiver is back they are not easily comforted and resist their effort in comforting them. In an insecure/avoidant attachment the infant is, “indifferent and seems to avoid the mother, they are as easily comforted by a stranger, as by their parent” (Siegler 2011, p.429). Lastly, the disorganized/disoriented attachment is another insecure attachment style in which the infant has no way of coping with stress making their behavior confusing or contradictory. Through these brief descriptions of the attachment theory, many researchers have defined the turning point in which each attachment definition can have an influence on one’s self esteem, well-being and their marital relationship.

Like Mary Ainsworth a colleague of his whose own research help develop the attachment theory went on to do her own observational research, Ainsworth identified three different attachment styles; secure, insecure avoidant and ambivalent/resistant that are the results of early attachment with the

Securely attached infants have a good quality of relationship with their parents. In the strange situation, where parents leave their child alone or with a stranger in a room full of toys, these children are upset when their parents leave, but easily comforted when they return. The child uses the parent as a “secure base” from which to explore the environment. In the strange situation, insecure/resistant infants

Harry Harlow 's research on monkey 's support 's Bowlby 's theory of attachment as he investigated ‘the nature of human love and affection ' (Cherry, 2016) through monkeys. This shows Harlow 's experiments demonstrated the importance of early attachments, emotional bonds and how attachment increases a healthy development. Harlow 's experiment consisted of ‘two wired surrogate mothers and an infant monkey separated from their mother hours after birth. One of the wired monkeys had a soft terrycloth around it and the other one only had food attached with to it. ' (Cherry, 2016) This was set up to find out which wired monkey the baby monkeys would be attached to more. Harlow 's study showed that ‘the

Infants with attachment disorder can be described as being either securely attached or insecurely attached. Securely attached children rarely reach the anxiety overload threshold. There are three types of insecure attachment: resistant, avoidant and

Attachment is the foundation for a strong relationship between caregivers and children. Children usually become attached to the person who cares for them most often during their first year of life. There is secure and insecure attachment which can affect a child and their future.