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Strange Situation (strange + situation)
Selected AbstractsAttachment and sensitivity in family context: the roles of parent and infant genderINFANT AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 4 2006Sarah J. Schoppe-Sullivan Abstract This study examined the role of child gender in fathers' and mothers' sensitivity to and attachment relationships with their infants from a family systems perspective. Eighty-seven 1-year-olds participated in the Strange Situation with each parent. Parental sensitivity was examined during a competing demands task. Results indicated that fathers and mothers were equally sensitive to sons, but fathers were less sensitive than mothers to daughters, and mothers were more sensitive to daughters than to sons. Although mothers and fathers within the same families were similarly sensitive to daughters and sons, daughters' attachment security with fathers and mothers was similar whereas sons' was not. Further analyses revealed that fathers were more sensitive to sons with an insecure relationship with their mothers. Results of this investigation suggest that child gender is relevant for parent,infant, especially father,infant, attachment relationships. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Maternal unresolved attachment status impedes the effectiveness of interventions with adolescent mothersINFANT MENTAL HEALTH JOURNAL, Issue 3 2005Greg Moran Children of adolescent mothers are at risk for a variety of developmental difficulties. In the present study, the effectiveness of a brief intervention program designed to support adolescent mothers' sensitivity to their infants' attachment signals was evaluated. Participants were adolescent mothers and their infants who were observed at 6, 12, and 24 months of age. The intervention conducted by clinically trained home visitors consisted of eight home visits between 6 and 12 months in which mothers were provided feedback during the replay of videotaped play interactions. At 12 months, 57% of the mother,infant dyads in the intervention group and 38% of the comparison group dyads were classified as secure in the Strange Situation. Seventy-six percent of the mothers in the intervention group maintained sensitivity from 6 to 24 months compared with 54% of the comparison mothers. Further analyses indicated that the intervention was effective primarily for mothers who were not classified as Unresolved on the Adult Attachment Interview. [source] The emotional quality of childcare centers in Israel: The Haifa study of early childcareINFANT MENTAL HEALTH JOURNAL, Issue 2 2005Nina Koren-Karie Data from an Israeli project shows higher proportion of insecurely attached infants in center care as compared with noncenter care (Sagi, Koren-Karie, Gini, Ziv, & Joels, 2002). The present study was designed to assess structural and emotional aspects characterizing infants' experiences in center care, aiming to explain, in part, the high incidence of attachment insecurity among center-care infants. In the present study, we focus on 151 center-care infants who were observed in the Ainsworth Strange Situation (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) with their mothers. Sixty-one percent of them were coded as securely attached to their mothers while 39% were coded as insecurely attached. In addition, 56 directors and 120 caregivers in 56 centers were videotaped throughout a full-day observation. The Assessment Profile of Early Childhood Program (Abbott-Shim & Sibley, 1987) was also employed. Results indicated that the centers in Israel are of low standards: Large group size, high caregiver,infants ratio, inadequate professional training, and minimal attention to individual emotional needs. No associations were found between infants' attachment and various aspects of the settings. The low quality of the Israeli settings may explain the higher rate of attachment insecurity in center-care infants. ©2005 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health. [source] AQS security scores: What do they represent?INFANT MENTAL HEALTH JOURNAL, Issue 3 2004A study in construct validation In a sample of 129 Dutch 15-month-old infants, attachment security was assessed both with the Attachment Q-Set (AQS; Waters, 1995) and with a short version of Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall's (1978) Strange Situation (SSS). Infants classified as secure using the SSS had significantly higher AQS scores than insecure and disorganized infants in particular. At the AQS item level, disorganized infants were described as significantly more noncompliant, fussy, and angry relative to secure infants. When security as assessed using the SSS was controlled, the observed quality of parental interactive behavior, parental ego-resilience, high levels of infant task orientation and pleasure, and low levels of infant anger proneness were found to explain significant and unique portions of the variance in the AQS security scores. The apparently unfavorable set of characteristics associated with low AQS security scores suggests such scores to predict later developmental problems. ©2004 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health. [source] Parenting and attachment among toddlers with congenital anomalies: Examining the Strange Situation and attachment Q-sortINFANT MENTAL HEALTH JOURNAL, Issue 6 2002Melissa Clements This study assessed parent and child predictors of attachment in a sample of 72 toddlers with neurological (e.g., cerebral palsy) and non-neurological (e.g., cleft lip and palate) birth defects and their mothers. Parenting quality (e.g., sensitivity) was expected to be more important in predicting the attachment relationship than type and severity of child medical condition. Parenting and indices of severity of child condition were measured via researcher observation. Attachment was measured via the Strange Situation and parent reported Attachment Q-sort. Parenting quality was better for children with more severe appearance disfigurements. Strange Situation and Q-sort assessments of attachment were not significantly related. Children with neurological impairments were at greater risk for developing insecure attachments than were children with non-neurological conditions. Parenting quality also directly predicted Strange Situation assessed attachment security and Q-sort comfort seeking/exploration but not standard Q-sort criterion scores. Parenting quality partially mediated the relation between child medical condition and attachment security. Results suggest child medical factors influence parenting, and thereby, child attachment. ©2002 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health. [source] Interplay of genes and early mother,child relationship in the development of self-regulation from toddler to preschool ageTHE JOURNAL OF CHILD PSYCHOLOGY AND PSYCHIATRY AND ALLIED DISCIPLINES, Issue 11 2009Grazyna Kochanska Background:, A broad capacity for deliberate self-regulation plays a key role in emotion regulation. This longitudinal investigation from infancy to preschool age examines genotype by environment (G × E) interaction in the development of self-regulation, using molecular measures of children's genotypes and observed measures of the quality of early mother,child relationship, as reflected in attachment organization in infancy. Methods:, In 89 children, we assessed the polymorphism in the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR, ss/sl vs. ll allele status), security of attachment to mothers at 15 months in the Strange Situation, and children's ability for self-regulation at 25, 38, and 52 months, using behavioral batteries of tasks that called for deliberately suppressing a dominant response and performing instead a sub-dominant response. Results:, There was a robust G × E interaction between genetic risk and the quality of early relationship. Among children who carried a short 5-HTTLPR allele (ss/sl,), those who were insecurely attached developed poor regulatory capacities, but those who were securely attached developed as good regulatory capacities as children who were homozygotic for the long allele (ll,). There was no effect of security for ll homozygotes. Conclusions:, Those findings, consistent with diathesis-stress model, bridge research on self-regulation in typically developing children with research on non-human primates and research on psychopathology. They also indicate that a secure attachment relationship can serve as a protective factor in the presence of risk conferred by a genotype. [source] The Significance of Insecure Attachment and Disorganization in the Development of Children's Externalizing Behavior: A Meta-Analytic StudyCHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 2 2010R. Pasco Fearon This study addresses the extent to which insecure and disorganized attachments increase risk for externalizing problems using meta-analysis. From 69 samples (N = 5,947), the association between insecurity and externalizing problems was significant, d = 0.31 (95% CI: 0.23, 0.40). Larger effects were found for boys (d = 0.35), clinical samples (d = 0.49), and from observation-based outcome assessments (d = 0.58). Larger effects were found for attachment assessments other than the Strange Situation. Overall, disorganized children appeared at elevated risk (d = 0.34, 95% CI: 0.18, 0.50), with weaker effects for avoidance (d = 0.12, 95% CI: 0.03, 0.21) and resistance (d = 0.11, 95% CI: ,0.04, 0.26). The results are discussed in terms of the potential significance of attachment for mental health. [source] Emotion Dialogues Between Mothers and Children at 4.5 and 7.5 Years: Relations With Children's Attachment at 1 YearCHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 1 2007David Oppenheim It was examined whether secure infant,mother attachment contributes to emotionally congruent and organized mother,child dialogues about emotions in later years. The attachment of 99 children was assessed using the Strange Situation at the age of 1 year and their emotion dialogues with their mothers were assessed at the ages of 4.5 and 7.5 years. Dialogues were about past emotional events and separation of a child from parents, and were classified into an emotionally matched group or 1 of 3 non-emotionally matched groups. Security in infancy was associated with emotionally matched dialogues at the age of 4.5; there was moderate stability in dialogues between 4.5 and 7.5 years; and infant attachment predicted dialogues at 7.5 beyond the prediction offered by age 4.5 dialogues. [source] Attachment from Infancy to Early Adulthood in a High-Risk Sample: Continuity, Discontinuity, and Their CorrelatesCHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 3 2000Nancy S. Weinfield This study explores the stability of attachment security and representations from infancy to early adulthood in a sample chosen originally for poverty and high risk for poor developmental outcomes. Participants for this study were 57 young adults who are part of an ongoing prospective study of development and adaptation in a high-risk sample. Attachment was assessed during infancy by using the Ainsworth Strange Situation (Ainsworth & Wittig) and at age 19 by using the Berkeley Adult Attachment Interview (George, Kaplan, & Main). Possible correlates of continuity and discontinuity in attachment were drawn from assessments of the participants and their mothers over the course of the study. Results provided no evidence for significant continuity between infant and adult attachment in this sample, with many participants transitioning to insecurity. The evidence, however, indicated that there might be lawful discontinuity. Analyses of correlates of continuity and discontinuity in attachment classification from infancy to adulthood indicated that the continuous and discontinuous groups were differentiated on the basis of child maltreatment, maternal depression, and family functioning in early adolescence. These results provide evidence that although attachment has been found to be stable over time in other samples, attachment representations are vulnerable to difficult and chaotic life experiences. [source] Physiological effects of separation and reunion in relation to attachment and temperament in young childrenDEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOBIOLOGY, Issue 2 2007Mirjam Oosterman Abstract This study examined physiological effects of separation and reunion in a sample 3- to 6-year-old children. Using continuous ambulatory recording, changes in heart rate (HR), respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and pre-ejection period (PEP) were compared across the episodes of a separation,reunion procedure based on the strange situation. RSA decreased significantly over the course of the procedure as well as on separation from the parent and not the stranger, supporting that separation from the attachment figure elicited vagal withdrawal in young children. The absence of significant PEP effects suggest that the separation,reunion procedure, and more specifically separation from the parent, was not threatening enough to activate the sympathetic nervous system, even if children were insecure attached and inhibited with regard to strangers. Some of the variability in HR increases to reunion was explained by younger age. The findings highlight the role of the ANS as a regulatory process in the parent,child relationship. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 49: 119,128, 2007. [source] Young infants' vocalizations towards mother versus stranger: associations with the infant,mother relationshipINFANT AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 5 2005Susanne Völker Abstract Infants' differential vocal response (DVR) towards their mother and a female stranger at 3 months of age has been predominantly investigated as an index of early cognitive functioning. The present study explored the relationship between DVR and different infant and mother indicators of the developing relationship quality in a sample of 23 mother,infant dyads. Mother,infant interactions and stranger,infant interactions were videotaped during home visits when the infants were 3 months old. At the age of 12 months, infants' behaviour was assessed in the Ainsworth's strange situation. In both assessments, mothers noted the infants' behavioural states on 3 successive days. Results revealed a specific relation between DVR and the emotional atmosphere of the early mother,infant interaction. Particularly, DVR was less pronounced in favour of the mother when the mother displayed emotional expressions defined as rejection. DVR is discussed as an index that may indicate both infant emotional engagement and infant cognitive competencies. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The adult attachment interview and self-reports of romantic attachment: Associations across domains and methodsPERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS, Issue 1 2000PHILLIP R. SHAVER Two lines of research on adult attachment have emerged; both are based on Bowlby and Ainsworth's attachment theory, which in turn relies on evolutionary theory. Investigators in one tradition use the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) to assess "state of mind with respect to attachment." The AAI has been validated primarily by its ability to predict the attachment classification of an interviewee's child in Ainsworth's "strange situation." Investigators in the second tradition use self-report measures to assess romantic "attachment style." The self-report measures have been validated by their ability to predict features of romantic/marital relationships. Although the two constructs. state of mind and romantic attachment, are importantly different and so would not be expected to relate highly, some of their components, especially ability to depend on attachment figures, should be related if both stem from a person's attachment history. We report associations between components, or aspects, of the two measures. Overlap occurs mainly in the areas of comfort depending on attachment figures and comfort serving as an attachment figure for others. Implications of the findings for attachment theory and research, as well as for evolutionary psychology, are discussed. [source] | |||||||||||||