Cultural variations in attachment

Question 1

Outline Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg’s procedure

Answer 1

-meta analysed 32 studies using strange situation
-15 done in US
-analysed 1990 children

Question 2

Outline Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg’s findings

Answer 2

-GB= 75% secure attachment, 23% avoidant, 2% resistant
-China = 50% secure attachment,24% avoidant, 26% resistant

-individualist countries insecure resistant is similar to ainswoth research - resistant attachment below 14%
-collectivist countries - resistant attachment was above 25%

-variation between studies in the same country were 150% greater than between different countries- US secure attachment ranged from 50% to 90%

Question 3

Outline the Italian study by Simonelli et al. (2014)

Answer 3

• assessed 76 babies at 12 months
• 50 % secure attachment and 36% avoidant
• researcher suggested this was because greater number of mothers were working long hours and children were in childcare more

Question 4

Outline the Korean study by Mi Kyoung et al. (2012)

Answer 4

-assessed 87 babies
-similar proportions of similar and insecure but babies were more insecure resistant - only 1 baby avoidant
-similar to japan study and thus due to similar child rearing techniques

Question 5

What are strengths of cultural variations research?

Answer 5

-Indigenous researchers: German team- Grossman et al (1981) and Keiko Takahashi for japan study which would mean probles of cross-cultural research would have been overcome such as language barriers. This also includes bias because of one’s nation’s stereotypes of another. This means these studies are valid as the researchers and participants would have communicated well.
HOWEVER:
Gilda Morelli and Edward Tronick were Americans researching attachment in Efe of Zaire so their data may have been affected by difficulties in gathering data from participants outside their culture. This means that some studies may have been affected by bias and difficulties with cross-cultural communication.

Question 6

What are weaknesses of the cultural variations study?

Answer 6

-Imposed etic: trying to impose a test designed for one culture onto another. Imposed etic is when we assume an idea or technique that works in one cultural context will work for another. we assume the strange situation is a universal technique for measuring attachment but it may not work in other cultures as it was designed in Britain and the US.
Britain- lack of affection = avoidant but in Germany this can be seen as independence rather than insecurity. This means that behaviours measured by the strange situation may not have the same meaning in different cultural contexts.

Confounding variables: Studies in different cultures are not usually matched for similar methodology when compared in meta-analyses.sample characteristic such as poverty and urban/ rural can confound results. Environmental variables could affect results - e.g. size of room: babies might be seen to explore more in small, attractive rooms rather than large bare rooms. Less visible proxmity seeking because of room size might mean an attachment will be classified as avoidant. This means that looking at attachment behaviour in different non-matched studies conducted in different countries may not tell us anything about cross-cultural patterns of attachment.