Klaus E. Grossmann

The Uniqueness of the Child–Father Attachment Relationship: Fathers’ Sensitive and Challenging Play as a Pivotal Variable in a 16‐year Longitudinal Study

This longitudinal study of forty-four families explored fathers’ as compared to mothers’ specific contribution to their childrens attachment representation at ages 6, 10, and 16 years. In toddlerhood, fathers’ and mothers’ play sensitivity was evaluated with a new assessment, the sensitive and challenging interactive play scale (SCIP). Fathers’ SCIP scores were predicted by fathers’ caregiving quality during the first year, were highly consistent across 4 years, and were closely linked to the fathers’ own internal working model of attachment. Qualities of attachment as assessed in the Strange Situation to both parents were antecedents for childrens attachment security in the Separation Anxiety Test at age 6. Fathers’ play sensitivity and infant–mother quality of attachment predicted childrens internal working model of attachment at age 10, but not vice versa. Dimensions of adolescents’ attachment representations were predicted by fathers’ play sensitivity only. The results confirmed our main assumption that fathers’ play sensitivity is a better predictor of the childs long-term attachment representation than the early infant–father security of attachment. The ecological validity of measuring fathers’ sensitive and challenging interactive play behavior as compared to infant proximity seeking in times of distress is highlighted. Findings are discussed with respect to a wider view on attachment in that both parents shape their childrens psychological security but each in his or her unique way.

Maternal sensitivity and newborns' orientation responses as related to quality of attachment in northern Germany.

Our longitudinal study was conducted in Bielefeld, North Germany. In our home observations we focused on infant crying and maternal responsiveness, on behaviors relevant to close bodily contact, and on infant responses to brief everyday separations and reunions. All these behaviors were found by Ainsworth et al. (1978) to be closely linked to the development of different patterns of infant-mother attachment. We also used Ainsworths maternal sensitivity scale to make global ratings of maternal behavior during the infants first year and correlated these ratings with infant attachment patterns in the Strange Situation. In addition, we tried to ascer-

Effects of Infant Attachment to Mother and Father on Quality of Adaptation in Preschool: From Dyadic to Individual Organisation of Self.

A total of 39 children, classified in Ainsworths Strange Situation at 12 and 18 months of age with their mothers and fathers, were observed in play groups and given a cartoon-based social perception test at 5 years of age. Children with anxious attachment histories (primarily avoidant in this sample) differed from those with secure histories on a number of single variables, and behavioural profiles based on combinations of variables showed strong significant differences in quality of play, conflict resolution, and problem behaviours. Measures of play competence, conflict resolution, and behaviour problems were significantly related to infant-mother attachment for girls, but not for boys. Overall competence, however, was significantly related to attachment to the mother for both boys and girls. Children with anxious attachment histories also showed misperceptions of cartoon stimuli, more often perceiving negative intentions than children with secure histories. Between-group differences were notably stronger using classifications with mothers than classifications with fathers. However, effects based on combined attachment information with both mother and father were more powerful for some variables.

Attachment and adolescents' emotion regulation during a joint problem-solving task with a friend

This study looks at adolescents’ emotion regulation patterns during a joint problem-solving situation with a friend, based on data from a longitudinal study. Specifically concurrent attachment representation, as assessed by the Adult Attachment Interview and earlier infant-father and infant-mother attachment patterns, as assessed by the strange situation procedure are used as predictors. A total of 41 adolescents participated in a complex problem-solving situation with their friends and were videotaped during their work. Emotional expression and cooperative and uncooperative, disruptive behaviour were assessed from the videotapes. Each participant completed an emotion self-rating during the task. The results show that the concordance between the two levels of assessment of emotion relates to attachment representation for the emotions sadness and anger. Depending on the intensity of specific emotions, adolescents with insecure attachment representations showed more disruptive behaviours towards their friend. This was also true for adolescents with insecure infant-father attachment patterns. The findings suggest that attachment organisation in adolescence and infancy influences the balance between autonomous and cooperative problem solving between friends.

Infant–mother attachment at twelve months and style of interaction with a stranger at the age of three years.

LOTKENHAUS, PAUL; GROSSMANN, KLAUS E.; and GROSSMANN, KARIN. Infant-Mother Attachment at Twelve Months and Style of Interaction with a Stranger at the Age of Three Years. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1985, 56, 1538-1542. This study explores the relation between the quality of infant-mother attachment at 12 months and the childs style of interaction with an unfamiliar visitor at age 3 years. Quality of infant-mother attachment was assessed in Ainsworths Strange Situation. At age 3 years, the children were visited in their homes and a competitive game interaction between child and visitor was videotaped. Children classified as securely attached at 12 months interacted faster and more smoothly with the visitor than children who had been avoidantly attached. Microanalyses of the competitive game also revealed different styles of interaction. Failure feedback led to increased effort in the secure-attachment group and to decreased effort in the insecure-attachment group. After failing, securely attached children tended to display sadness more openly than insecurely attached children.

Attachment working models as unconscious structures: An experimental test:

Internal working models of attachment (IWMs) are presumed to be largely unconscious representations of childhood attachment experiences. Several instruments have been developed to assess IWMs; some of them are based on self-report and others on narrative interview techniques. This study investigated the capacity of a self-report measure, the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA; Armsden & Greenberg, 1987), and of a narrative interview method, the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI; George, Kaplan, & Main, 1985), to measure unconscious attachment models. We compared scores on the two attachment instruments to response latencies in an attachment priming task. It was shown that attachment organisation assessed by the AAI correlates with priming effects, whereas the IPPA scales were inversely or not related to priming. The results are interpreted as support for the assumption that the AAI assesses, to a certain degree, unconscious working models of attachment.

The Wider Concept of Attachment in Cross-Cultural Research

A phylogenetic propensity of human infants is to become attached. During ontogenesis, different qualities of attachment relationships develop. Caretakers’ responsiveness to infants’ signals of insecurity seems to be the main determinant of secure versus avoidantly or ambivalently insecure infant behaviors to mothers or fathers at 1 year of age. An individual’s ‘inner working model’, resulting from differential dyadic attachment history, may determine how (inner) emotional conflicts are resolved. On the basis of existing longitudinal data, the following emotional response styles appear to be prevalent: Individuals with secure attachment histories pay attention to the full range of external causes for conflicting emotions, and they tolerate contradictory emotions. Individuals with insecure attachment histories, in contrast, pay attention only to selected fractions of their emotional reactions at any given time, and they tend to lose sight of the full range of external causes for potentially conflicting emotions. These developmental consequences appear to be universal. Cultural differences may exist in terms of frequency and difficulty of potentially conflicting challenges imposed on individuals. The wider view of attachment has to consider both aspects, the universal and the culture-specific, when testing the full potential of attachment theory from a life course perspective.

Attachment state of mind and perceptual processing of emotional stimuli

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between attachment state of mind and perceptual processing of social and non-social, affective, and neutral material. A total of 57 young adults completed the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) plus an experimental task in which their perceptual thresholds to different types of pictures were assessed. Significant correlations were found between the AAI dimensions and perceptual thresholds for social stimuli such as social interactions or human faces displaying emotional expressions. As expected, no relationships were found between the AAI and perception of neutral stimuli. The pattern of correlations was especially clear for the dismissing dimension. The results suggest that higher vigilance to social stimuli is related to dismissing attachment tendencies and, to a milder degree, to preoccupied tendencies.

Paths to Successful Development: Attachment relationships and appraisal of partnership: from early experience of sensitive support to later relationship representation

Introduction Part of Bowlbys developmental writing focused on the accumulation of empirical evidence towards the most far-reaching hypothesis provided by psychoanalysis, namely, that the mother-child relationship has profound influences on the psychological development of the child well into adulthood (Bowlby, 1969/82, 1973, 1979). Bowlby saw a strong relationship between an individuals experience with his parents and his later capacity to make affectional bonds (Bowlby, 1987). The major goal of this chapter is not only to provide support for the viewpoint that attachments are a life-long concern, but also to argue for the influence of the childs early attachment experiences and representations on his or her later partnership representations. In support of this argument, we will demonstrate three pathways from infancy to young adulthood that point in the direction of the quality of later partnership representation. They are as follows: a) maternal sensitivity turned out to be a strong predictor even from the earliest assessments on; b) attachment assessments in childhood and adolescence but not in infancy predicted later partnership representation; and c) assessments of discourse quality about attachment issues made a unique contribution to the prediction of later partnership representation. The three pathways were closely interrelated suggesting that the roots of adult partnership representation can be found in interactive assessments, in discourse, or in standard assessments of attachment.

Is Attachment at Ages 1, 6 and 16 Related to Autonomy and Relatedness Behavior of Adolescents in Interaction towards Their Mothers?.

This study investigates whether attachment quality at ages 1, 6 and 16 is related to autonomy and relatedness behavior in adolescence. In a follow-up of the Regensburg Longitudinal Study, forty-three 16-year-old adolescents and their mothers were assessed in a revealed differences task and a planning a vacation task. Attachment was assessed during infancy using the Ainsworth Strange Situation and at age six with the reunion procedure. Adolescent attachment representation was assessed using the Adult Attachment Interview. Results provided no evidence for significant continuity between infant or childhood attachment behavior and adolescent attachment representation. Instability of attachment organization, however, was linked to a higher number of experienced risk factors. Substantial relations between adolescent attachment representation and adolescent autonomy and relatedness behavior were found in both interaction tasks with their mothers. Further, significant relations between attachment qualities at ages 1 and 6 and adolescent interaction behavior during the planning a vacation task at age 16 were found. Thus, independent of attachment stability or instability, both early attachment in infancy and childhood and concurrent attachment representation were significantly related to autonomy and relatedness behavior in adolescence.