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Summary AQA Psychology A Level Attachment Topic Notes
A complete summary of the Attachment topic for A Level Psychology Paper 1.
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A LEVEL PSYCHOLOGY - Paper 1 - ATTACHMENTCaregiver-infant interactions in humans
Attachment definition
An emotional tie or bond between an infant and their primary caregiver. This tie is reciprocal
as each person is attached to the other. Maurer & Maurer (1989) suggest that interaction is
important rather than just spending time together.
How do we know that an attachment had formed?
Maccoby (1980) identified 4 characteristic effects of an attachment:
● Seeking proximity, especially at times of stress
● Distress on separation
● Pleasure when reunited
● General orientation of behaviour towards the primary caregiver
Why do infants form attachments?
● Because the person pays the attention and plays with them
● The person rewards the infant
● They show them love
● Because the person feeds them
● The person keeps them safe and cares for them
Evolutionary reasons infants form attachments:
● Innate tendency - ensures survival (Lorenz & imprinting)
● Preprogrammed in adults – ‘social releasers’
● Short term benefits – ensures food & safety
● Long term benefits – of fundamental importance for future relationships.
Why do caregiver-infant interactions happen?
● A way to communicate in order to develop and maintain an attachment bond
between carer and infant.
● Infancy - period of a child’s life before speech begins (1st year, some psychologists
also include the 2nd year).
● Key interaction is non-verbal communication.
● These interactions form the basis of attachment between an infant & caregiver. The
more sensitive each is to each other’s signals – the deeper the relationship and the
attachment.
Caregiver-infant interactions: Reciprocity
Research in the 1970s demonstrated that infants coordinate their actions with caregivers in a
kind of conversation.From birth, babies move in a rhythm when interacting with an adult, as if
they are taking turns, as people do in a conversation. Both parties being able to produce
responses from each other helps to deepen the attachment bond. The responses are not
necessarily the same, it is turn-taking e.g. baby puts its arms up, parent tickles them.
Caregiver-infant interactions: Interactional synchrony
When two people interact they tend to mirror what the other is doing in terms of facial & body
movements. This includes imitating/mimicking emotions as well as behaviours. This is
,described as a synchrony – when two or more things move in the same pattern
Similarities between reciprocity and interactional synchrony
● Both look, feel and act like a conversation between infant and caregiver (even if no
words are used).
● Both involve a 2-way interaction with 2 active contributors (caregiver + infant) – can
anticipate how each other will behave + elicit particular response from each other.
● Likely to involve similar sounds, emotions and behaviours (e.g. smiling, laughing)
Differences between reciprocity and interactional synchrony
● The word reciprocal means two-way. Infant and caregiver are responding to each
other – one after the other. They take turns (e.g. you go, I go).
● WHEREAS The word synchrony means a simultaneous action or occurrence.
Relates to the timing and pattern of the interaction. The interaction is rhythmic and
can include infant and caregiver mirroring each other’s behaviour and emotion.
Meltzoff and Moore’s Study
Procedure:
● Controlled observation
● Selected four different stimuli (3 different faces plus a hand gesture) and observed
the behaviour of infants in response
● Bbserver watched videotapes of infant’s behaviour in real time, slow motion and
frame by frame if necessary
● Video then judged by independent observers who had no knowledge of what the
infant had just seen
● Each observer asked to note all instances of infant tongue protrusions and head
movements using these behavioural categories:
○ mouth opening - abrupt jaw drop opening the mouth across entire extent of
lips
○ termination of mouth opening - return of lips to their closed resting position
(lips closed and touching across entire extent or there might be a small crack)
○ tongue protrusion - clear forward thrust of tongue such that the tongue tip
crossed the back edge of the lower lip
○ termination of tongue protrusion - retraction of tip of tongue behind the back
edge of the lower lip
○ each observer scored the tapes twice so that both intra-observer and
inter-observer reliability could be calculated - all scores were greater than 92
Observations
● Found there was an association between the infant behaviour and that of the adult
model
● Later study in 1983 demonstrated same synchrony with infants only 3 days old
● The fact that infants as young this were displaying the behaviour would appear to
rule out the possibility that the imitation behaviours are learned ie the behavioural
responses are innate
Meltzoff and Moore AO3 Evaluation
Was it a real imitation?
P- M&M’s claims that imitation in infants is intentional and innate has been criticised
, Ev- Piaget (1962) – true imitation only develops toward the end of 1st year, anything before
this is just operant conditioning – the infants repeat the behaviour because it has been
rewarded. They have learned the behaviour (nurture). A consequence of an infant sticking
out their tongue after a caregiver, would be that the caregiver smiles, this would encourage
the infant to repeat the behaviour.
Ex- Therefore what the infant would be doing is just pseudo-imitation. They might not be
consciously translating what they have seen into a matching movement. This means
behaviour isn’t innate but instead learned.
Research support
P- However, a counter criticism of this point is that there is research to support M&M’s
findings.
Ev- Tronick’s Still Face Experiments found that infants tried to attract their mothers’ interest,
but when gaining no response turned away. This shows that the infant was actively eliciting a
response rather than displaying a response that has been rewarded.
Ex- Therefore, this shows that infants are an active and intentional partner in the
mother-infant interaction and further supports the notion that such behaviours are innate
rather than learned.
Problems with testing infant behaviour
P- There is reason to have some doubt about the findings of research on the facing page
because of the difficulties in reliably testing infant behaviour.
Ev- Infants' mouths are in fairly constant motion and the expressions that are tested occur
frequently (tongue sticking out, yawning, smiling). This makes it difficult to distinguish
between general activity and specific imitated behaviours. To overcome these problems
Meltzoff and Moore measured infant responses by filming infants and then asking an
observer (who had no idea what behaviour was being imitated) to judge the infants'
behaviour from the video.
Ex- This research highlights the difficulties in testing infant behaviour, but also suggests one
way of increasing the internal validity of the data.
Failure to replicate
P- Other studies have failed to replicate the findings of studies on the facing page.
Ev- For example, a study by Koepke et al. (1983) failed to replicate Meltzoff and Moore's
findings; Meltzoff and Moore counter argued that the research by Koepke et al. failed
because it was less carefully controlled. Marian et al. (1996) replicated the study by Murray
and Trevarthen and found that infants couldn't distinguish live from videotaped interactions
with their mothers, which suggests that the infants are actually not responding to the adult.
Marian et al. acknowledged that the failure to replicate may lie with the procedure.
Ex- Therefore, the earlier studies' findings were not replicated in later studies, although
differences in methodology may account for this.
Individual differences
P- An important feature of interactional synchrony is that there is some variation between
infants.
Ev- Isabella et al (1989) found that more strongly attached infant-caregiver pairs showed
greater Interactional synchrony. Heimann (1989) showed that infants who demonstrate a lot
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