Defining Attachment

Question 1

What is attachment?

Answer 1

A strong emotional bond that forms between an infant and their primary caregiver

Question 2

Who may the primary caregiver be?

Answer 2

Oftentimes it is the mother, however, it can be a father, grandparent, older sibling or another adult

Question 3

What common features do caregiver-infant interactions have?

Answer 3

Sensitive responsiveness
Imitation
Interactions synchrony
Reciprocity/turn-taking
Motherese

Question 4

What is sensitive responsiveness?

Answer 4

The caregiver responds to signals from the infant

Question 5

What is imitation?

Answer 5

The infant copies and mimics the actions of the caregiver

Question 6

What is interactional synchrony?

Answer 6

The infant and caregiver mirror what the other is doing
This includes actions and emotions and is a coordinated interaction

Question 7

What is reciprocity?

Answer 7

Infant and caregiver elicit a response from each other and it becomes a back and forth interaction

Question 8

What is motherese?

Answer 8

The caregiver adopts a slow, sing-song way of speaking to the infant

Question 9

AO3 - Interactional synchrony and its application to adult relationships

Answer 9

One strength of the research into interactional synchrony is its application to later adult relationships.
Meltzoff (2005) developed a ‘like me’ hypothesis, where he believes that babies carrying out imitations in their childhood, is the fundamental basis for all social relationships.
This is a strength of the research as it can explain how children begin to understand what others think and feel and thus able to conduct relationships.

Question 10

AO3 - Effect of individual differences on caregiver-infant interactions

Answer 10

One criticism of research investigating caregiver-infant interactions is the effect of individual differences.
For example, Heimann (1989) showed infants who demonstrate lots of imitation from birth onwards have had a better quality of relationship at three months.
What is this evidence is important as a basis of child development, it is not clear whether the imitation is a cause or effect of this early synchrony or the type of attachment.

Question 11

AO3 - Research investigating intentional behaviour

Answer 11

One strength of examining infant behaviours comes from research investigating intentional behaviour.
Abravanel and DeYong (1991) observed infant behaviour when interacting with two objects. Infants between 5 to 12 weeks made little response to these objects.
This concluded that babies don’t imitate everything they see - it is a specific social response to humans only.