Cultural Variations of Attachment

Question 1

What was van Ijzendoorn’s cultural variation study?

Answer 1

• researchers located 32 studies of attachment where the stranger situation had been used to assess attachment types of babies, 8 countries and 15 in USA
• data from these 32 studies was meta analysed to get results

Question 2

What were the results of van Ijzendoorn’s cultural variations study?

Answer 2

• in all countries secure attachment was the most common 75% in UK and 50% in China
• in individualist cultures the rates of insecure-resistant attachment was similar to Ainsworth’s original results but in collectivists the results were all over 25%
• overall secure attachment is the norm around the world which supports Bowlby’s theory of attachment being innate

Question 3

What is a strength of cultural variation studies in attachment?

Answer 3

• strength of indigenous research as the research team from each country was made up of people from that place e.g Grossman in Germany and Takahashi in Japan - this reduced behaviour being misunderstood when reporting their findings - high validity

Question 4

What are 2 limitations of cultural variation studies in attachment?

Answer 4

• limitation of confounding variables as the study had to be altered for each country e.g room size, poverty, age and toys available which can all affect how the baby behaves
• limitation of imposed etic which is where we impose a technique that works in one culture onto another e.g in UK a lack of affection during a reunion could be seen as insecure-avoidant attachment whereas in Germany it could be seen as just being independent