Attachment Advice for parents in light of psychological research
Attachment is an area of social psychology which has been widely studied. It is therefore necessary to define the term "attachment" before examining how it has been studied, and in what ways research in this field can be used to provide advice for parents. Attachment may be described as a penetrating and continuing connection which is established between a child and its caregiver in the first several years of its life. The process of attachment has far reaching influences over every aspect of the human condition including emotions, the mind, the body, relationships and values. Attachment is not a process that the caregiver imposes on the child, it is an ongoing reciprocal relationship that the caregiver and the child create together. Therefore for the purposes of this essay attachment will be examined under the definition of a, "mutual regulatory system" (the child and caregiver influencing one and other over time).# One of the first and arguably one of the most influential theorists to examine the area of attachment was John Bowlby. ... He published his report in 1951 which argued that, "babies form a special attachment with one particular person- their Mother (monotrophy)".# Bowlby also found in his research that there was a critical or sensitive period in which attachment has to take place. ... Much of Bowlbys work arose from the long term separation of children from their mothers, where the loss of attachment may be seen as a trauma. ... "# In a study of fifty eight infants, Shafter and Emerson recorded that seventeen percent of infants had more than one attachment figure. After four months fifty percent of the infants had more than one attachment figure. By the age of eighteen months eighty seven percent had more than one attachment figure. ... It is not as simple as who the attachment is made to i. ... the mother, but the style of the caregivers interactions with a child which creates the attachment bond. Bowlbys theory of attachment also fails to question whether the effects of early deprivation are reversible.