AQA A Level Psychology Attachment with questions and answers.

Benefits of an attachment - Survival Food Love Security Briefly explain classical conditioning - Learning a behaviour through stimulus, response and association Briefly explain operant conditioning - Learning a behaviour through rewards reinforcements and punishments Describe evidence for the effects of institutionalisation - A longitudinal study was conducted on 156 Romanian orphans who had been adopted to the UK to see what extent good care could make up for effects institutions. Many aspects of the child's development were assessed at 4, 6, 11 and 15 years of age. A control group of 52 British children adopted at the same time was used. They found that 50% of the children showed signs of mental retardation/malnourished. Children adopted before 6 months has an average IQ of 100, between 6 and two years were 90 and after 2 years 80. Children adopted after 6 months were more likely to show signs of reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited attachment disorder. Zenah assesed attachment in 95 children aged 1-3 years old that spent 90% of their life institutionalised. Compared to a control group of 50 participants. He used the strange situation to measure attachment type. He found that there were 65% insecure and 19% were secure. The control group had 74% secure. Describe the effects of institutionalisation - Reactive detachment disorder - This is caused by an extreme lack of sensitive responsiveness from a parent in early life and it leads top children unable to trust or love others, they ultimately end up isolated, selfish and aggressive and can end up being sociopathic.Disinhibited attachment disorder- This is where a child may select attachment figures discriminately which can cause them to become overly comfortable around strangers. Evaluate Ainsworth's Strange Situation - :( - Lacks ecological validity as it was fake environment with unrealistic task. Means it is difficult to generalise the three different attachment styles to other children in the real world. :( - The SSC has been criticised for imposed etic. The tool is based on western practices and ignores cultural norms and practices in collectivist cultures. We must take caution when using it in cultures it is not designed for. :( - Low pop validity, hard to generalise :( - Criticised for being over simplified, other psychologists believe that you cant fit every child into one of three attachment types and that there are large individual differences between children that play a huge part. This lowers the value of the insight into children's attachment types and development. Evaluate Bowlby's Monotropic Theory - :) - Brazleton observed mothers and babies interact and showed that there was interactional synchrony. In further experiments he instructed the PCG to ignore the babies signals (social releases). He found that after some distress the babies curled up and remained motionless. The fact the children responded so strongly supports Bowlbys theory. :) - Hazan printed a love quiz in an American newspaper. They collected information about individuals early attachments and their current attachments wth loved ones. They found that securely attached children had happy and long lasting relationships in later life. insecurely attached children found it hard to form relationships. This supports the IWM. :( - Bowlby stated that the only use of the father was to support the mother however Lamb indicated that as an infant grows older they show a preference towards the father, this therefore contradicts Bowlbys theory. :( - Other psychologists criticise Bowlbys mono-tropic theory for not accepting the role of the child's temperament. It has been shown that some babies are born more social or more anxious than others. Therefore this could explain later social behaviour rather than the IWM. Evaluate Harlow's Animal Study - :) - Many very useful practical applications have come from this as it gives us a very valuable insight into caregiver-infant attachment. It has helped social workers understand risk factors in neglect and instead of just making sure people have shelter and food that they are also being treated with love and care. :( - There are however drawbacks of this study and it is that it lacks the following of any ethical guidelines. The monkeys suffered greatly with irreversible effect and as they share a high percentage of humans gene pool they have strong emotions like us. However the argument is that the research is important enough to justify the effects on the monkeys.