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Insecure Attachment: A Case Study

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Attachment is organised into four different styles, secure attachment, insecure avoidant attachment, insecure resistant attachment and insecure disorganised attachment, all which are identified by Ainsworth (1970). In secure attachment situations the infants feel confident that their care-giver will be able to meet their needs. The infants use their caregivers for times of distress and as a safe base to explore the environment around them. (Main, & Cassidy, 1988). In times of separation the infants will want to be reunited with their care-givers usually by physical contact or interaction. After the physical contact or interaction, the infants feel soothed and are ready to return to their play. (Ainsworth et al., 1978). Mothers are generally …show more content…

The insecure avoidant attachment style children tend to be very independent, both physically and emotionally. Unlike children in secure attachment relationships, they do not use their caregivers as a safe base to explore the environment. (Behrens, Hesse, & Main, 2007). Insecure avoidant children are more likely to have caregivers who reject their needs and are insensitive towards the children. The children also do not seek their attachment figure with distressed. (Ainsworth, 1979). The attachment figure may avoid the child in times of emotional distress and helping undertake difficult tasks. (Stevenson-Hinde, & Verschueren, 2002). The attachment figure may also be unresponsive to their child’s signals and are more likely to interact irritably and angrily unlike the secure attachment figure. (Cassidy and Berlin 1994). In the reunion of the attachment figure and child, the child may turn away and continue to play and ignore the attachment figure completely. In the efforts of the caregiver trying to interact with the child while playing, the child will ignore the caregiver and move away. (Ainsworth et al.,

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Attachment is the condition of being attached to something or someone, in particular. (Google.com) In particular, according to Bowlby and Ainsworth, primarily their focus was the attachment to another human being, predominantly a care taker, prior to the age of five years old. Through these early years children go through different phases of attachment, all of importance to a person’s well-being and adjustments throughout the rest of their adolescent and adult life.

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Children are completely reliant on the adults in their early lives. Whether it is their biological parents, foster parents, or other family members, children need to be able to build upon healthy relationships in order to achieve normal development (Shonkoff & Phillips, 2004). In John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth’s “strange theory” there are four different kinds of attachment between the parent and child: secure attachment, anxious-ambivalent attachment, anxious-avoidant attachment, and disorganized attachment (Fraley, 2010). Not having a secure attachment in infancy can cause a multitude of problems. There are many aspects in a child’s life that can have an effect on whether or not the child is able to develop healthy relationships with adults

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Attachment Analysis There are four main attachment theories according psychologists Ainsworth and Bowlby. These attachments are secure, insecure-resistant, insecure-avoidant, and disorganized-disoriented. In the prompt, there are two toddlers (Sam and Maria) that experience varying attachment qualities. These toddlers are put into the Strange Situation in which the researchers will observe how they act before, during and after the primary caregiver’s absence.

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In Clip B the first time the mother leaves the child wonders where her mother went and goes to her mother when she returns. The second time the mother leaves Lindsey begins to cry and when the mother returns Lindsay goes to her mother and stops crying which shows secure attachment. Lindsey 's mother appears to be enthusiastic when playing with her child and consoles the child upon the second return. The book describes secure attachment as the child wants to be with the mother when the mother returns and may or may not cry when the mother leaves.

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Bowlby believed that infants are a product of evolutionary processes pre-coded with a survival instinct to form an attachment with an individual to provide it with comfort, guidance, safety and security (Bowlby 1958, cited in Lishman 2007) Generally attachments were formed with responsive persons who interacted and played with the child a lot, simple caregiving such as nappy changing was itself not an important factor. This strong attachment to the primary caregiver provides a strong base for exploration and reissuance when the child felt insecure (fox, 1977 pg 109). Bowlby believed that there are four main features of attachment. These are safe haven, he believed that the primary care giver would make the child feel safe, secure base, here

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Attachment theory suggests it is the quality of the relationship between the child and caregiver, which ultimately influences development (Sroufe & Seigel, 2011). Ideally, the child and caregiver should express attunement to one another (Sroufe & Seigel, 2011). Ainsworth’s Strange Situation experiment differentiated the securely attached child from the insecure child through the child’s reaction to the return of her caregiver after periods of separation (Sroufe & Seigel, 2011). The securely attached child “actively greet(s) and initiate(s) interaction with the caregiver upon reunion” (Sroufe & Seigel, 2011, p. 4). The securely attached child develops a positive “internal working model” (Schore & Schore, 2008, p. 12), influencing self-efficacy.

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He found that meeting children’s physical needs alone was insufficient and they were mentally damaged from the absence of a caregiver. After investigating further into the children’s past experiences, he noticed a link between all their upbringings – they had all suffered early separation from their mothers. By observing children’s behaviour who had been separated from their families, Bowlby found three consistent phases that made up “separation anxiety”. The first stage is to protest; the child will cry, scream and kick at the action of their parent leaving and often cling onto them in an attempt to prevent it from happening. The child’s protesting then begins to stop and they appear calmer yet still upset.

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According to Davies Attachment Theory, there are four types of attachment relationships between an infant and the caregiver(s) (229-232). After talking to my parents about how I reacted when they left a room when I was in an environment or around family members I was not familiar with, I demonstrated a secure attachment with my parents and my dad’s parents. Family members would say I was spoiled because I would cry and want either of my parents when they left the room. However, according to Ainsworth Strange Situation Experiment, that is a common characteristic of an infant and caregiver(s) secure attachment relationship. Due to this secure attachment relationship I had with my parents, I left safe in my environment.

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They both posit that children need healthy relationships with their primary caregivers to ensure healthy development. Childhood secure attachment is so crucial for a child’s development. It is the basis on which individuals use to define later relationships. The best kind of attachment is where the caregiver is dependable and reacts immediately to the child’s needs, which teaches a child they can rely on the adult to help them in future situations. When infants and children have this kind of attachment, they carry the feelings of attachment into subsequent close relationships, seeking to the same interactions that they had in their early attachment

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Children who have a secure attachment to their father tend to have improved developmental outcomes in a variety of ways including having improved social abilities with their peers, having fewer problem behaviors, and the paternal effects on developing a greater level of emotional self-regulation are especially significant. In addition, having a secure father-child attachment relationship can help compensate for potentially harmful effects resulting from an insecure mother-child attachment relationship. A child who is securely attached to his or her father will explore freely while the he is present, typically engages with strangers, is often visibly upset when the parent departs, and is generally happy to see the parent return (McLeod, 2014).

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The babies were visited monthly and the carers were also observed and interviewed. A diary was also kept by the primary care giver (usually the mother) three measure were recorded. The first was stranger anxiety – the response to the arrival of a stranger, the second was separation anxiety – the distress levels when separated from the career and the degree of comfort upon their return and finally social referencing – the degree that the child looks at the carer to check how they should respond to something new (this is referred to as secure base). They discovered that a baby’s attachment follows in this sequence. • 0-6 weeks – Asocial –

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This attachment style is hard to change, but is not impossible. As determined before, parents are a child's primary attachment figure which helps children learn how to live and survive within the world. They will also use the skills that parents provide them with when they age and have children of their own (Mónaco, Schoeps, & Montoya-Castilla, 2019). When these adolescents are infants and have an increase in communication and trust, it indicates a secure attachment style. These parents use warmth and communication in creating this attachment style for their adolescents (Mónaco, Schoeps, & Montoya-Castilla, 2019).

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1. Secure attachment. Securely attached people have positive views for themselves and for their attachments. Secure attachment are promoted by a caregiver who is emotionally available and appropriately responsive to his or her child's attachment behavior. (Chris & Shaver, 2000).

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Attachment is “not synonymous with love or affection; it is not an overall descriptor of the relationship between the parent and child which includes other parent–child interactions such as feeding, stimulation, play or problem solving” (Prior, 2006, pg 15) Attachment theory is based on a emotional and physical attachment that is important to the personal development of a child. The attachment is shown by some behaviors in infants, such as needing closeness with the attachment figure when upset or threatened, the infant uses the figure as secure base that the child can use when in need of security and comfort (Bowlby, 1969). Any caregiver is the attachment figure who provides most care for the infant and is their primary social communication. This can be biological parents or anyone who the infant feels the attachment with.

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For example, lets say the kid is in the room with the parent and then all of the sudden the parent leaves, the child starts to cry and be disruptive. The parent then returns to the room and the child feels safe and stops crying. This is what attachment is.

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