3.2 schaffers stages of attachment

Who proposed the stages of attachment

Schaffer and Emerson

What are the 4 identifiable stages of attachment

1. Asocial stage

2. Indiscriminate stage

3. Specific attachment

4. Multiple attachments

Stage 1: asocial stage

• first few weeks of life

• Behaviour towards humans and inanimate objects is similar

• Show slight preference to people, especially those who are familiar (more easily comforted by them

• Begins forming bonds, these form the basis of later attachment

Stage 2: indiscriminate attachment

• from 2-7 months

• Clear preference for human over inanimate objects

• Recognise and prefer the company of familiar people

• Do not show separation anxiety or stranger anxiety

Stage 3: specific attachment

• from around 7 months

• Displays the signs of attachment towards one person (stranger anxiety and separation anxiety)

• This person is the primary attachment figure.

• This person offers the most interaction and responds to the babies signals with the most skill (the mother 65% of the time)

Stage 4: multiple attachments

• form after specific attachment. 29% form them within a month, majority by age 1

• Begin to display signs of attachment to multiple people (stranger and separation anxiety)

• These are called the secondary attachments

Explain Schaffer and Emerson’s research

• observational study of 60 Glasgow babies from working class families

• Visited the babies every month for 1 year, then again at 18 months

• They asked the mother questions about the kind of protest their babies showed in 7 everyday situations, also assessed stranger anxiety

Evaluation — good external validity

• the observations were made by parents during ordinary actives so the babies were distracted or anxious due to a researcher

• Counterpoint - but the mothers aren’t objective. They were biased so may not have been accurate

Evaluation — poor evidence for the asocial stage

• young babies have poor co-ordination so it would be hard to identify if the baby was anxious

• Babies appear to be asocial but may be social

Evaluation — real world application

• can be applied to daycares. Revealing that daycare may be problematic during the specific attachment stage

• So parents can plan daycare according to the stages

Evaluation — generalisability

• the study is not generalisable to collectivist cultures

• This is because multiple attachments are more common in collectivist cultures (Van Ijzendoorn)