Slides Week 5 Flashcards
(96 cards)
Bonding
- The early relationship formed between mother and infant
- Early belief that post birth bonding was critical for later social development.
- It is now thought that attachments are formed with infants through daily interaction.
- Infants are predisposed to respond to human interaction:
- A few days after birth Infants show clear preference for their mother’s face.
- At One year children use their mother’s emotional expressions to guide their own behaviour in ambiguous situations
Social Referencing
- Relying on another person’s emotional reaction to appraise an uncertain situation
- Starts at 8–10 months
- Caregiver’s role very important
- Helps evaluate safety and security
- Guides actions
- Aids in gathering information about others
Bonding and Temperament
The infant’s temperament is determines:
- The type and amount of social interaction in which they engage with others.
- The quality of the bonds established with their primary caregivers
Temperament Chart
Elements of Personality
- Melancholic
- Choleric
- Phlegmatic
- Sanguine
Measure and Observe Temperament
- Difficult to define and measure and observe
- No clear-cut distinction between temperament and personality
- Key dimension of personality
- Evident from birth.
- Shapes Attachment and subsequent intimate relationships.
Three General Temperament Patterns
- Easy (Flexible)
- Slow to warm up (Fearful)
- Difficult (Feisty)
Each individual’s temperament shows their style of expressing needs and emotions
Temperament Type - Basic Clusters
- Chess & Thomas Basic Clusters

Temperament - Australian Study
- Sanson, Prior, Oberklaid 1985
- 2,443 representative Melbourne families
- Infants aged 4 months - 8 months
- Four temperaments identified
- Babies rated middle of most of the dimensions that showed difference between easy and difficult
- Easy 39%
- Average 40%
- Slow to warm up 8%
- Difficult 12%
Temperamental Differance
- Cause of temperamental difference unclear
- Possible psychological basis suggests association between colic, sleep disturbance and temperament classification
- Not related to:
- Birth order effects
- Birth in Rural v Urban environment
- Individual Gender
- Evidence for Cohort difference indicating environmental factors shape temperament
Temperamental Difference - Smart & Sanso 2005
- Smart & Sanson (2005):
- Compared infant temperament patterns in two cohorts of infants.
- Australian Temperament Project (ATP): commenced in 1983
- Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC): commenced in 2004
- THREE facets of temperament style assessed:
- Approach-Sociability, Cooperation-adaptability, Irritability-soothability
- Findings were that ATP infants scored higher in irritability than LSAC infants.
- Reason:
- Parents of LSAC infants older and better educated.
- Improved personal and social resources (e.g., maturity, income, parent education) for parenting role.
Tempermental Stability
- Persistences of infant temperament over time is likley but not inevitable
- Mood tone is most likely to be stable over time
Mood Tone
refers to the overall tone of a person’s feelings
Temperamental Stability - Young, Fox & Zahn-Waxler (1999):
- High activity + negative mood at four months (i.e., difficult) à less altruism & empathy at 2 years (i.e., less responsive to mother’s distress).
Temperamental Stability - Lewis (1993)
- Negative mood tone (frequent expression of intense negative emotions – anger, distress) at 3 months
- Poor cognitive performance at 4 years (even after other variables controlled for).
Temperamental Stability - Caspi & Silva (1995)
- 800 NZ boys and girls from birth -18 years
- “Lack of control” at 3 years [rough in play (Activity), distractible, hard staying still (Distractibility), dramatic mood swings (Responsiveness)]
- Risk taking, sensation seeking, low regard for authority, negative emotional response to everyday events, enmeshment in adversarial relationships at 18 years.
- Explanation: environmental engineering
- Shy child growing up in extroverted environment = more likely to be rejected
Temperamental Stability - Continuity & Change
- There are both continuities and change in temperament over time:
- Studies have shown clear longitudinal continuity of temperament
- Explanation: Children as niche pickers – select environments that match their genetic predispositions
- Patterns of interactions lead to same conditions being recreated
- Goodness of fit With child temperament + parenting styles
Goodness of Fit
- Thomas & Chess 1977
- Degree of overlap between infant’s temperament and parents image of ideal child
- If good fit then continuity of temperament is observed
- If poor fit then Parental effort to change infant can modify initial temperament tendancies
- If modification is successful the discontinuity in temperament is observed
Conclusions about Temperament
- Biological basis to temperament
- A number of facets/dimensions to temperament
- Children’s temperament matters for their development and well being
- Reactivity/Irritability/cooperation in infancy can put a child at risk for development of behaviour problems (e.g., aggression, hyperactivity)
- Temperament influences development directly and indirectly through in the type of interactions it elicits from others around the child.
Attachment Defined
- Deep, affectionate, enduring relationship to another individual.
- Bowlby (1969):
- Studies of infants and children orphaned in WWII.
- Infants biologically motivated to form attachments because they ensure survival.
Role of the Mother - Bowlby
- Studies of institutionalised children in the 1940s and 1950s
- Influenced development of contemporary attachment theories.
- Bowlby: subsequent problems of these children resulted from being deprived of the experience of bonding to a mother.
- Children deprived of consistent care by a mother were:
- Developmentally delayed.
- Showed later forms of psychopathology, e.g., delinquent personalities.
- This hypothesis = Maternal Deprivation Hypothesis.
Maternal Deprivation Hypothesis
- Bowlby
- Suggests that continual disruption of the attachment between infant and primary caregiver (i.e. mother) could result in long term cognitive, social, and emotional difficulties for that infant.
- Originally believed the effects to be permanent and irreversible.
Role of the Father
- Bowlby:
- Institutionalised infants who were also deprived of fathers
- Their later psychopathology was not attributed to paternal absence.
- Initially suggested that fathers are as crucial to their child’s development as mothers.
- However, it also shows that fathers have a unique role in the child’s development.

