Attachment Theory – Part One
Introduction
The person one grows to be in the future is largely determined by childhood experiences and the attachments experienced from infancy to late childhood. Children learn various behaviours from as early as 1 year old and they carry some of these characteristics into adulthood. People have different personalities, respond differently in a given situation, and present different emotional responses. The latter is a result of the various infant attachments experienced during infancy and childhood.
The writer is interested in covering this topic because it is intriguing and entertaining to learn how adults acquired some of the character traits they possess. It is also important to handle the topic under discussion as it helps solve the mystery of the difference in behavior among people.
There are various types of attachments that one has as an infant and they influence the person they become as an adult. The author’s aim is to identify these attachments, discuss them in detail and outline the impact they have on adult life. The impacts could either be positive or negative and they portray different character traits in different people. It is also the writer’s duty to discuss where the attachments originate from or who provides the attachment.
John Bowlby worked as a psychiatrist when he came up with the attachment theory after having realized the importance of the relationship between the child and the mother; in terms of the child’s social, emotional, and cognitive growth (McLeod 2009). According to Bowlby, the child experienced distress once separated from the mother; evidence that there is an existing attachment. The withdrawal from the mother leads the child to develop characteristics of fear and anxiety and they may persist up to adulthood.
Types of Attachment and Attachment Behaviors by Bowlby
An attachment is an emotional tie to someone special that is characterized by seeking and maintaining closeness, mostly in stressful moments (Bowlby, 1988). The bond is also characterized by time and space, in that it becomes deeper when the parties concerned are in constant contact. An attachment is not necessarily reciprocal; one party could have an attachment while the other feels the opposite.
Types of Attachment by Bowlby
There are four types of attachment patterns as identified by Bowlby. The first type is a secure attachment, which is alike to Erikson’s basic trust (Barker, n.d.). This attachment involves a sense of confidence created in the infant that the attachment object will respond anytime it is needed and mostly during distress (Malekpour, 2007). Secure attachment helps the infant establish the template on which they will create their future relationships with other people. This type of attachment also ensures that the child is secure enough to explore the world in the future and their resilience to distress. Secure attachment is an important attachment to acquire as it also helps the child in balancing their emotions, make sense of their lives, and acts as a tool to help them establish worthy and beneficial interpersonal relationships (Bowlby, 1988). A secure attachment is known to provide the most relevant foundation for the future developments that matter most to human beings; therefore no infant should be deprived of this attachment.
The second type of attachment as described by Bowlby is the avoidant attachment. Avoidant attachment entails a relationship whereby the child feels that they do not require relying on other people for their needs and for this same reason, they attempt to meet the attachment needs on their own (Holmes and Bowlby, 2010). The mother or the caregiver plays a role in the creation of this kind of attachment by being absent and it makes the infant get lost in their world, thus avoiding any emotional relationship (Barker, n.d.). When the child grows into adulthood, this attachment affects them in that they remain both physically and emotionally unattached to people (Malekpour, 2007). These adults also appear to be self-centered as a result of creating distance and they end up becoming unresponsive to other people’s requirements.
Bowlby discovered another type of attachment that is known as an ambivalent attachment which is characterized by emotional clinging and goes hand in hand with frustration, distress, and resentment (Barker, n.d.). The parent or the caregiver may leave the child on many occasions than one and it creates fear. The infant is not sure of when the parent or caregiver may leave or when they may return. The child is filled with uncertainties. When the child experiences such inconsistency, they become fearful and anxiety mounts in, as they do know not what to expect (Bowlby, 1983). The ambivalent attachment has consequences on the child after they become adults and these could be negative. As an adult, he/she may be present at one moment and absent at the next (Malekpour, 2007). These adults are also faced with the problem of arguing and never reaching to a consensus. Their deep insecurity which was experienced during childhood may also fan their urge to over-attach with others (Malekpour, 2007).
The fourth type of attachment pattern by John Bowlby is known as the disorganized attachment. It entails fear of getting into relationships and the difficulty to develop a workable solution that is meant to help them interact with that which they are attracted to (Barker, n.d.). The parent or the caregiver could be blamed for this type of attachment as they ignore the need for the infant’s emotional closeness (Bowlby, 1988). Some mothers avoid offering their children the emotional love and comfort that they may require, thus pushing them away. Others are unpredictable and so the child becomes disoriented and aggressive, both traits which lead to a disorganized infant (Barker, nd). When the child becomes an adult, they are unable to regulate their emotions in all platforms concerning life; such as social and academic reasoning. In terms of love relationships, the victim of this kind of attachment will not be responsive and sensitive to their partner’s needs (Furnivall, 2011). The partner may show signs of withdrawal and inconsistency and this triggers enragement in the victim of disorganized attachment (Barker, n.d.).
According to John Bowlby, the attachment’s quality critically affects the infant’s development and it has been associated with the subject’s psychological well-being (Davey, 2016). Therefore, if an infant lacks the type of attachment they may require during early life, they end up acquiring some psychological malfunctions such as withdrawal from other people. Bowlby came up with different styles of attachment and attachment behaviors after conducting research on children at an institution he was working. According to Bowlby, a child usually has an innate (inborn) need to get close to the focal attachment figure, that is the mother; commonly referred to as monotherapy (Waters et al., 2002).
The type of attachment described in the previous paragraph is, however, disrupted when the child lacks the attention they require. Maternal deprivation is the term that Bowlby used to describe the situation mentioned above. Maternal deprivation is a situation whereby the mother is either absent for long periods or non-responsive within the first two years of the child’s life (Davey, 2016). Bowlby noted that mothering was of no use to the infant’s development if it was only provided after two to three years, as those are the most critical stages of development. A child needs the mother for protection and affection and when they miss this opportunity, they are likely to look for other sources apart from the mother. The child misses out on that crucial moment and it may affect their adult life, whereby they keep away from the rest. Bowlby observed that attachment is a continuous process that runs throughout a person’s life, happening from ‘cradle to grave’ (Kope and Reebye, 2007). Therefore, the mother/caregiver should not be absent at any time.
The contributions towards attachment theory by Bowlby are influenced by ethology; which is a study of man’s and animal behavior (Boundless, 2016). The latter means that children develop attachments biologically due to genetics. Children develop behaviors such as crying, smiling and cooing among others so as to encourage caregivers to provide the necessary platform for attachments (Holmes, 2001). The child uses these characters to keep the parent close as a way of avoiding danger and distress. According to Bowlby, the caregiver becomes the ‘secure base’ for the child and the secure base is either molded during infancy or not (Boundless, 2016). The secure base can be created successfully if the parent maintains close proximity with the child and it can fail to develop when the caregiver is absent or non-responsive. At this stage of secure base, the parent offers the child a reliable foundation as the child develops to sort things on their own (Sincero, 2012). The attachment theory also allows the child to enjoy a safe haven whereby he/she can rely on the parent for comfort in times of threat or danger (Sincero, 2012).
According to John Bowlby, an attachment is supposed to take place between 0-5 years and if it fails to happen, the child is likely to suffer from irreversible developmental impairment (McLeod, 2009). The child suffers from reduced intelligence and is highly aggressive. Bowlby identified the four steps of attachment development as follows; ‘preattachment, attachment in the making, clear cut attachment and formation of reciprocal relationships’ (Boundless, 2016, n.p.).
The pre-attachment stage begins from birth up to 6 weeks. During this period, the child has built-in signals for example crying and smiling, which bring the infant into close proximity with the parent (Holmes, 2001). The child can identify the caregiver’s smell and voice and the two offer comfort to the infant. These are just the beginnings of the formation of attachment so even when the baby is left with a stranger; they still feel secure (Holmes, 2001). More bonding is required for the complete formation of the attachment that is useful up to adulthood.
The second stage known as attachment-in-the-making runs from 6 weeks to 8 months. At this point, the bonding is getting stronger and this can be witnessed with the infant responding differently to strangers (Bowlby, 1990). An infant is also seen to be more interactive with the mother as opposed to a relative who appears once in a while. Parents and caregivers are encouraged to continue giving care and meeting the child’s basic needs; as a way of facilitating the development of the attachment.
The third stage of attachment development is known as clear-cut attachment and it runs from 8 months to one and a half years. During this stage, attachment to trusted parents and caregivers strengthens and separation anxiety may occur if the caregiver is absent (Bowlby, 1990). The child prefers to be with their usual caregivers and they will follow, climb on them or seek the parent’s attention by doing things such as crying. Parents and caregivers are encouraged to be receptive to the toddler’s basic requirements such as playing with them so as to enhance attachment development (Bowlby, 1983).
The final stage of attachment is known as the formation of reciprocal attachment and it is experienced from one and a half to two years of childhood. The child is rapidly growing and they can easily understand the going and coming of the parent or caregiver; thus separation anxiety reduces (Boundless, 2016). For a working parent, the child gets used to the time the parents leave and the time they come back from work. However, the child still tries to get the caregiver’s attention by let’s say crying before they leave for work so as to spend more time with their attaché (Bowlby, 1988). Although attachment could be speculated to have been fully developed during this stage, the parent/caregiver should be present as much as they can. The toddler still requires the affection and the secure base offered by the parent.
On attachment behaviors, Bowlby argued that the traits such as crying were a result of separation from the attachment figure and he called them adaptive responses (Fraley, 2010). Bowlby further explained that just like mammalian infants, human infants can neither feed nor care for themselves and so they have to depend on that adult figure, which is wiser and capable of providing for the infant. If an infant was able to maintain close proximity with the caregiver throughout childhood via attachment behaviors, Bowlby observed that this child would most likely reach reproductive age (Fraley, 2010). From his findings, Bowlby came up with a system known as the Motivational System which he referred to as the attachment behavioral system (Fraley, 2010). The system ‘was gradually designed by natural selection to regulate proximity to an attachment figure’ (Fraley, 2010, n.p.).
Mary Ainsworth on Attachment Theory
Mary Ainsworth is a known psychologist and they studied together with Bowlby in the area concerning attachment theory. Mary also came up with various types of attachments which will be discussed later in this paper. One of the major achievements by Ainsworth is the development of a laboratory-controlled situation which was known as the ‘strange situation’ (Hong and Park, 2012). Ainsworth conducted a study by placing a mother and 1-year-old infant pairs in a room and had them play with toys as she noted their reactions after moments of separation, say 20 minutes. Ainsworth was looking to see if the infant would either be interested in playing with the toys or using the mother as a secure base while clinging to them for safety (Ainsworth, n.d.). Ainsworth was also interested in finding out the reaction of the toddler if the mother was to leave the room and a stranger entered the same room. The researcher wanted to know if the child could be distressed at first and then come down or if they could remain distressed the whole period the mother was absent. The third purpose of the experiment by Ainsworth was to determine the reaction of the infant after the return of the mother (Hong and Park, 2012).
After carrying out the experiment, Ainsworth found out that most of the toddlers had acquired secure attachments (Ainsworth, n.d.). The infants were observed to play and explore with no pressure, but only when their parents were around (Hong and Park, 2012). Upon the ext of their mothers, the children were observed to become upset but always calmed quickly when the mothers returned to the room (Hong and Park). However, there were rare cases whereby some toddlers were less concerned with their parents and they were observed to be less distressed when they left the room. The latter patterns were named avoidant attachment by Ainsworth (Grossman et al., 2016). The rest of the infants who did not possess any of the patterns described above fell into the third group of attachment. These children were always anxious even in the presence of their mothers and although they protested heavily upon the exit of their parents, they showed no signs of comfort upon their return (Hong and Park, 2012). Ainsworth named the latter pattern ‘ambivalent (anxious-ambivalent, resistant) attachment’ (Hong and Park, 2012, n.p.). The three patterns discussed herein were presented according to the mother’s style by Ainsworth.
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