ATACHMENT THEORY Attachment theory created by Richard Bowlby a British psychiatrist has been mainly used in child psychology and is highly referenced in many situations and has been used broadly. In this paper the aim is to evaluate attachment theory in both experimental and historical context and reach an overall conclusion on how reliable and broad this theory is. Attachment theory is usually very good at predicting outcomes but sometimes may stumble when there are huge cultural differences. Some weak points of attachment theory may be said to be that some parts of it is based on Freudian ideas. Richard Bowlby lived in London and experienced the World War II first hand and his theory was mainly influenced by the kids who were sent out of
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He was influenced by Freud. In this context, attachment means the unique emotional bond between a child and a caretaker (Bowlby, 2007). This is very much like Freud Bowlby believing that a person’s character and behavior is heavily influenced by the experiences they had in their childhood and their relationship with their parents. Freud’s views about these issues has had a lot of criticism by modern psychological theories. Some assumptions Bowlby makes in roots of this theory could be based on Freud’s theories which means that it could be set up on primitive ideas with little empirical support.
A major contributor to this theory, Mary Ainsworth, Bowlby’s student studied the different type of responses when the child’s secure base (parent) left the room or when a stranger walked in. The children were placed in a new environment with their mothers and their responses were monitored in these kinds of situations (Ainsworth, Salter & Bell, 1970 ). These observations helped Ainsworth come up with different types of children parent attachment. These different types were summarized by Fraley and Shaver (2000) as secure, ambivalent, avoidant, and …show more content…
The Zeanah, Berlin and Boris (2011) stated that infants are born without being attached and these attachments are made in certain periods in a child’s life. The critical time periods where bio-behavioral shifts occurred were 2-3 months, 7-9 months and 18-20 months of age. In the article it is mentioned that these stages should be taken to great consideration in clinical cases. Zilberstein(2014) suggested that attachment theory can be extremely useful making recommendations to parents about treatment according to attachment styles. Considering treatment of small children can be extremely challenging and attachment theory based approach to medical treatment can smooth out a lot of issues. Another big problem is underage drinking which may also be related to attachment theory. Lac, Crano, Berger and Alvaro (2013) used 351 young adults who were under the drinking age in United States and concluded a research about attachment and its connection excessive underage drinking. They found a strong relation with attachment and excessive underage drinking and about how different attachment styles affect behavior towards alcohol in early ages. In all three articles it is clearly seen that attachment theory could predict certain behaviors and help in many fields of child
He was influenced by Freud. In this context, attachment means the unique emotional bond between a child and a caretaker (Bowlby, 2007). This is very much like Freud Bowlby believing that a person’s character and behavior is heavily influenced by the experiences they had in their childhood and their relationship with their parents. Freud’s views about these issues has had a lot of criticism by modern psychological theories. Some assumptions Bowlby makes in roots of this theory could be based on Freud’s theories which means that it could be set up on primitive ideas with little empirical support.
A major contributor to this theory, Mary Ainsworth, Bowlby’s student studied the different type of responses when the child’s secure base (parent) left the room or when a stranger walked in. The children were placed in a new environment with their mothers and their responses were monitored in these kinds of situations (Ainsworth, Salter & Bell, 1970 ). These observations helped Ainsworth come up with different types of children parent attachment. These different types were summarized by Fraley and Shaver (2000) as secure, ambivalent, avoidant, and …show more content…
The Zeanah, Berlin and Boris (2011) stated that infants are born without being attached and these attachments are made in certain periods in a child’s life. The critical time periods where bio-behavioral shifts occurred were 2-3 months, 7-9 months and 18-20 months of age. In the article it is mentioned that these stages should be taken to great consideration in clinical cases. Zilberstein(2014) suggested that attachment theory can be extremely useful making recommendations to parents about treatment according to attachment styles. Considering treatment of small children can be extremely challenging and attachment theory based approach to medical treatment can smooth out a lot of issues. Another big problem is underage drinking which may also be related to attachment theory. Lac, Crano, Berger and Alvaro (2013) used 351 young adults who were under the drinking age in United States and concluded a research about attachment and its connection excessive underage drinking. They found a strong relation with attachment and excessive underage drinking and about how different attachment styles affect behavior towards alcohol in early ages. In all three articles it is clearly seen that attachment theory could predict certain behaviors and help in many fields of child