User:Atcovi/Spring2024/Child Psychology/Ch. 7 - Infancy: Social and Emotional Development

Attachment: Bonds That Endure

 * Attachment - An affectional bond between individuals characterized by a seeking of closeness or contact and a show of distress upon separation. Mary Ainsworth came up with this definition, while John Bowlby believed it was essential for survivial.
 * Separation Anxiety - Fear of being separated from a target of attachment, usually a primary caregiver. Ainsworth came up with the Strange Situation method of measuring attachment.

Forms of Attachment

 * Secure attachment - A type of attachment characterized by showing mild distress at leave-takings, seeking nearness to an attachment figure, and being readily soothed by his figure. Overall, better relationships with parent, peers, teachers, and less behavior problems than insecurely attached children.
 * Insecure attachment is divided into avoidant attachment and ambivalent/resistant attachment.
 * Avoidant Attachment - A type of insecure attachment characterized by the apparent indifference to the leave-takings of, and reunions with, an attachment figure.
 * Ambivalent/Resistant Attachment - A type of insecure attachment characterized by severe distress at the leave-takings of, and ambivalent behavior at reunions with, an attachment figure.
 * Disorganized-disoriented Attachment (another category proposed) - A type of insecure attachment characterized by dazed and contradictory behaviors toward an attachment figure.

What Are the Roles of the Caregivers in the Formation of Bonds of Attachment?
Attachment = measure of the quality of care that infants receive. Caregivers can facilitate positive relationships with women of low-income status. Affectionate mothers get secure attachment, abusive mothers get insecure attachments.

What about the father?

Mothers are more likely to do maintenance/soft games than fathers (who will play/play rough). They are more involved with their children in developed nations than in the past. The diaper index is a real measurement! The more affectionate the interaction between father and infant, the stronger the attachment.

How Stable Are Bonds of Attachment?
Attachment patterns can change when the child care changes.

Are There Stages of Attachment? What Are They? (Ethological Theory)

 * 1) Indiscriminate attachment - the display of attachment behaviors toward any person. First 6 months, then wanes while specific attachments increase. Stranger anxiety follows after a month when the specific attachment increases. This is the initial pre-attachment phase (birth - 3 months, characterized by indiscriminate attachment).
 * 2) Attachment-in-the-making phase - Occurs at about 3-4 months and is characterized by preference for familiar figures.
 * 3) Clear-cut attachment phase - Occurs at about 6 or 7 months and is characterized by intensified dependence on the primary caregiver (usually the mom).

In most cultures, single attachments are the exception, not the rule (father, day-care providers, grandparents, other caregivers + mother).

Cognitive View of Attachment: Is the Caregiver Mentally Represented?

 * Infants must firmly grasp object permanence.

Behavioral View of Attachment: Is the Caregiver a Reinforcer?


 * Caregiver becomes a conditioned reinforcer, providing needs.

Psychoanalytic Views of Attachment: Is the Caregiver a Love Object?


 * Freud believed that the infant becomes emotionally attached to the mother during this time because she is the primary satisfier of the infant’s needs for food and sucking.
 * Erikson wrote that the mother’s general sensitivity to the child’s needs, not just the need for food, fosters the development of trust and attachment.

Both believed that needs, such as oral activities, trust in the mother, and fulfilling the child's needs, all played a role in such relationship.

The Harlows’ View of Attachment: Is the Caregiver a Source of Contact Comfort?

Contact comfort (being around someone is comforting) vs. just wanting food? [Harlow bros, 1966].

A presence of a mother figure provides security for exploration.

The Ethological View of Attachment: Evolution, Attachment, and Survival

 * Smiling is instinct, and a social smile may develop in infants to a human voice or face. This is critical for survival as baby's smile elicits caregivers' affection.

- Imprinting, attachment seems to take place during a 'critical' period. Konrad Lorenz may not look like Mommy to you, but these goslings became attached to him because he was the first moving object they perceived and followed. This type of attachment process is referred to as imprinting. Korenz believed attachment is a species-specific action pattern.

Issues in Attachment: Social Deprivation, Child Abuse, and Autism Spectrum Disorder
What Are the Effects of Social Deprivation on Child Development?

Little stimulation from caregivers = hella problems/delays.

Harlows studied rhesus monkeys that were socially confined avoided contact with others. They can make a comeback though.

We found institutionalized children who were neglected and found many of them lose interest in their world, become inactive, and some even die. It's sort of like a syndrome.


 * Classic studies by Leon Yarrow and his colleagues (Yarrow et al., 1971; Yarrow & Goodwin, 1973) suggest that deficiencies in sensory stimulation and social interaction may cause more problems than lack of love in infants who are too young to have developed specific attachments. However, once infants have developed specific attachments, separation from their primary caregivers can lead to problems.
 * In a second study: The researchers found strong correlations between the age at which the children were separated and later feeding and sleeping problems, decreased social responsiveness, and extremes in attachment behaviors.
 * Conclusion: least up to the age of 3 months or so, may require general sensory and social stimulation more than a specific relationship with a primary caregiver. After the age of 3 months, some disturbance is likely if there is instability in the caregiving staff. By the ages of 6–9 months, disturbance seems to be guaranteed if there is instability in the position of primary caregiver.

Children can catch up, if they were neglected early on, on their social and emotional development.

'''How Common Are Child Abuse and Neglect? What Are Their Effects?'''

Over 4 million reports of child abuse to authorities every year. There are 3 forms of child neglect:


 * 1) Physical neglect: a 2 year old who was found wandering in the street late at night, naked and alone.
 * 2) Educational neglect: A 12 year old who could go to school whenever and however long he wants.
 * 3) Emotional neglect: Siblings who saw their parents fight + a child whose mother helped him attack a lady.

Younger children are more likely to suffer than older children cuz they cry a lot. Neglect is passive whilst abuse is active.

How to prevent? Reporting to authorities, strengthen parent skills among general population (family planning classes in high school), programs for groups at high risk, info about abuse being rampant (child abuse hotlines), and increased publicity.

'''What Is Autism Spectrum Disorder? On Being Alone among the Crowd'''


 * Autism Spectrum Disorder is characterized by inability to engage, inability to accept change, communication problems, and repetitive behavior. Can be evident by age 3/before end of 1st year. ASD consists of a number of disorders, including Asperger syndrome.
 * The word autism derives from the Greek autos, meaning “self.”
 * The teacher of a 5-year-old autistic girl would greet her each morning with “Good morning, Lily, I am very, very glad to see you.” Lily would ignore the greeting, but she would shriek if the teacher omitted even one of the very’s. This feature of ASD is termed “preservation of sameness.”
 * Various lines of evidence suggest a key role for biological factors in ASD, including low birth weight and old parents. Some stuff about using certain areas of the brain (cerebral cortex) and less areas, including the frontal system.

Treatment?


 * Principles of learning
 * Behavior modification
 * Drugs that enhance serotonin activity (SSRIs)

Day Care
When placed in day cares, infants are...


 * Have insecure attachment.
 * High quality daycare = greater language and cognitive skills.
 * More aggressive.

There's some advice about good daycares here.

Emotional Development
Is Emotional Development Linked to Patterns of Attachment?
 * Emotion: State of feeling that has physiological, situational, and cognitive components. Infants start off with each positive attraction or withdrawal. Then, social smiling replaces reflexive smiling... and laughter soon follows.
 * Differential Emotions Theory - Izard's view that major emotions are distinct at birth, but emerge gradually in accord with maturation and the child's developing needs. Using his Maximally Discriminative Facial Movement Scoring System, Izard conferred that infants experience anger, joy, fear, and excitement.


 * Fear was the most powerful emotion with resistant children.
 * Avoidant children grew more fearful, and resist children became less joyful.
 * "At 33 months of age, securely attached children were less likely to show fear and anger, even when they were exposed to situations designed to elicit these emotions."

'''What Is Meant by Stranger Anxiety? Is It Something to Worry about?'''


 * Stranger anxiety, fear if unfamiliar people, emerges between 6 and 9 months of age. Less likely to showcase stranger anxiety when held by moms, mom is present, or in familiar surroundings.

Social Referencing

Social referencing is the using of another person's reaction to a situation to formulate one's own independent assessment. Components of this includes...


 * Looking at another older individual in a new situation
 * Put that individual's emotional response to the unfamiliar situation
 * Putting our own emotional response to that individual's response.

Carver and Vaccaro found that 1 year olds respond quicker to fear than neutral/positive emotions.

How Do Infants Regulate Their Emotions?


 * Emotional signals from adults
 * Through caregivers. Infants signal help is needed and the caregiver comes to the rescue.

Personality Development
Personality = An individual's distinctive ways of responding to people and events.

'''What is the self-concept? How does self-concept develop?'''

How have we assessed for self-concept?
 * Self-concept = One's view of one's self. Infants slowly understand the concept of self-concept, first by seeing their hand move in/out of sight, then understanding their little bodies can only go so far!


 * 1) Mirror technique - nose touching = children recognize themselves/have a mental picture of themselves. 18 month olds point at their nose.

Self-awareness increases infant's social and emotional development, encouraging sharing and cooperation & self-conscious emotions (shame, pride, embarrasment, etc.).

Temperament: Easy, Difficult, or Slow to Warm Up


 * Temperament: Individual differences in styles of reaction that are present early in life. Scientists believe it is the core of personality and has a strong, genetic component attached to it.

Thomas and Chess came up with 9 characteristics of temperament, with other additional characteristics.


 * 1) Activity level
 * 2) Smiling/laughter
 * 3) Regularity in child's bio functions (eating, sleeping).
 * 4) Approach/withdrawal from situations, people
 * 5) Adaptability to new situations
 * 6) Sensitive to sensory stimuli
 * 7) Intensity of responsiveness
 * 8) Quality of mood (cheerful or unpleasant)
 * 9) Disctractibility
 * 10) Attention span and persistence
 * 11) Soothability
 * 12) Distress when limits are placed

Three categories for these characteristics: easy, difficult, "slow to warm up". Research has found that there is moderate consistency in temperament development from infancy and onwards. Parents may facilitate or weaken a certain temperament.


 * Goodness of fit - Agreement between the parents' expectations of, or demands on, the child and the child's temperamental characteristics. A child's temperament does NOT mean the parents are "bad".

Gender Differences
What Are the Differences in Behavior between Infant Girls and Boys?


 * Girls tend to advance more rapidly in their motor development in infancy, as they sit, crawl, and walk earlier than boys do.
 * Girls and boys ONLY differ on what their preferences lie in when playing with toys and doing activities (dolls, toy animals vs. toy trucks, toy airplanes, and sports equipment). This happens as early as 12-18 months of age.

Do Adults Behave Differently in Their Interactions with Infant Girls and Boys?


 * When adults interact with a boy or a girl, they prefer them to more physical activity/sports toys vs. dolls and playhouses ('softer' stuff).

Do Parents Treat Their Infant Sons and Daughters Differently?


 * Parents are more rough with boys and talk (+ about feelings) to girls. Gender stereotypes match respective gender.