Les conversations mère-enfant et l'attachement des enfants à la période préscolaire.

This study examines whether mother-child conversation patterns are associated with child attachment classifications at preschool age (N=80). Results revealed that a child's discourse style is similar to that of her or his mother. In comparison with mothers of insecure ambivalent or disorganized children, mothers of secure children made more frequent verbal statements that elaborated emotional content. Mothers of avoidant children were more inclined to minimize emotional content than mothers of secure children. In comparison with other mothers, those with a disorganized child were sharing more frightening and hostile content, or made more verbal statements accompanied by aggressive behaviors. Secure children made more frequent verbal statements that elaborated emotional content than avoidant and disorganized children. Disorganized children made more controlling verbal statements as well as statements accompanied by aggressive or flight behaviors. Finally, our results showed that child capacity to elaborate emotional experiences partially mediated the link between maternal capacity to elaborate emotional content and child security of attachment. Our results emphasize the importance of mother-child conversational exchanges for the development of attachment in preschool children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Le r?le des interactions mère-enfant et de la dépression maternelle à l'age préscolaire dans la prédiction de l'attachement de l'enfant à l'age scolaire.

Examined the contribution of mother–child partnership and maternal depression during the preschool period to the prediction of the child's attachment classification at early school-age in 91 French-Canadian children. Mother–child interactions were observed during a collaborative task using a scale measuring synchronized and reciprocal social-affective exchanges in the mother-child partnership (age 3–5 yrs). Maternal depression was assessed during the same lab visit using the Beck Depression Inventory. At a second lab visit (age 5–7 yrs), attachment classifications were assigned on the basis of reunion behaviour. A discriminant function analysis showed that reciprocal mother–child partnerships in the absence of maternal depressive symptom predicted security of attachment two years later, whereas failed reciprocity in the presence of maternal depressive symptoms predicted both insecure disorganized and ambivalent attachment. Quality of prediction is high for secure, ambivalent and disorganized children, although ambivalent and disorganized children cannot be distinguished from each other. Results support the importance of mother–child interactions and maternal depression as preschool variables associated with security and insecurity of attachment at early school-age. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Correlates of Attachment at Age 3: Construct Validity of the Preschool Attachment Classification System.

This study examined correlates of attachment at age 3 to further validate preschool separation-reunion measures. Three-year-olds (N = 150) and their mothers participated in a separation-reunion protocol, the Preschool Attachment Classification System (PACS: J. Cassidy & R. S. Marvin with the MacArthur Working Group on Attachment, 1992), and a mother-child interaction session during a laboratory visit. Mothers also completed psychosocial measures and, along with teachers, evaluated child behavior problems. The secure and disorganized groups received, respectively, the highest and lowest interaction scores. Disorganized children showed a higher level of teacher-reported externalizing and internalizing problems than did secure children. Mothers of insecure children reported higher child externalizing (all insecure groups) and internalizing (avoidant group) scores, more personal distress related to emotional bonding (disorganized group), childrearing control (ambivalent group), and child hyperactivity (avoidant group). Results strongly support the validity of the PACS as a measure of attachment in 3-year-olds. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment at school age and academic performance.

The association between attachment and school-related cognitive functioning was longitudinally examined for a French Canadian sample of 108 school-age children. The affective quality of mother-child interaction patterns, child cognitive engagement, and quality of child attachment to mother were evaluated during a laboratory visit that included a separation-reunion procedure occurring when the children were approximately 6 years of age. Children's mastery motivation and academic performance were assessed 2 years later (at age 8). Analyses indicated that secure children had higher scores than their insecure peers on communication, cognitive engagement, and mastery motivation. Controlling children were at greatest risk for school underachievement, with the poorest performance on all measures except mastery motivation. Avoidant and ambivalent children were lowest on mastery motivation. Results of mediational analyses support the salience of mother–child interactional processes and child cognitive engagement at school age in explaining relations between attachment and cognitive functioning in school. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Correlates of attachment at school age: maternal reported stress, mother-child interaction, and behavior problems

The contribution of attachment, maternal reported stress, and mother-child interaction to the prediction of teacher-reported behavior problems was examined for a French-Canadian sample of 121 school-age children. Attachment classifications were assigned on the basis of reunion behavior with mother when the children were between 5 and 7 years of age. Maternal reported stress and mother-child interaction patterns were assessed concurrent to the attachment measure, whereas behavior problems were evaluated both at ages 5 to 7 and 7 to 9 years. Security of attachment significantly predicted the likelihood of school-age behavior problems: Controlling/other children were most at risk for both externalizing and internalizing problems across both age periods. Younger ambivalent children presented clinical cut-off levels of externalizing problems, and older avoidant boys had higher internalizing scores. Patterns of maternal-reported stress and mother-child interaction differed across attachment groups and contributed to prediction of school-age behavior problems, partially mediating the relation between attachment and adaptation. Results support the importance of attachment in explaining school-age adaptation and validity of attachment coding for children of this age.     

L'attachment à l'age scolaire et le développement des troubles de comportement.

The purpose of this longitudinal study was to examine the association between the mother–child attachment relationship and behavioural problems among a test group of 120 Francophone Canadian children from mixed social and economic backgrounds. The Strange Situation protocol was used to measure attachment styles when the children were between the ages of 5 and 7 yrs. Each child's behavioural difficulties were assessed by his or her educator or teacher during 3 developmental periods: 3–5 yrs, 5–7 yrs, and 7–9 yrs. Results show that disorganized insecure attachment is associated with an increased risk of developing exteriorized and interiorized behavioural troubles between the ages of 5 and 7. The authors also observed exteriorized behavioural problems among children with anxious-ambivalent attachment, especially in the 3–5 age group. Avoidant children, usually assessed positively, received exteriorization scores during the 5–7 period which were significantly below those of securely attached children. Avoidant boys also exhibited more interiorized symptoms during this time-frame. Analyses of the persistence of behavioural problems also showed increased risk among disorganized and ambivalent children with secure or avoidant attachment styles. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Modifying maternal teaching style: effects of task arrangement on the match-to-sample performance of retarded preschool-age-children

Twenty-one mothers and their retarded preschool-age children were observed during six teaching sessions. Following the first three sessions, each mother-child dyad was assigned to one of the three groups. Groups were matched on measures of mother and child behavior and on measures of various mother and child background factors. Prior to the last three teaching sessions, mothers received instructions to modify certain aspects of their teaching style. The results indicated that children of mothers who had been instructed to present the materials of the task systematically obtained significantly higher performance scores during training than did children of mothers who either received no instruction or had been told to increase positive feedback for correct responses. Further, 6 of 7 children whose mothers had altered the manner in which they presented the task materials showed improvement on a test administered after training. These results suggest that nonverbal activities which precede responding are critical aspects of teaching style and deserve more attention than they have received in the past.     

Association entre l'attachement mère-enfant et les récits d'attachement à la période scolaire.

The objective of the present study was to examine which narrative dimensions distinguish attachment groups. Children's attachment pattern with mother was assessed at age 6 (n = 127; M = 75 months; SD = 12.55) using the Main and Cassidy (1988) separation-reunion classification system. Two years later (n = 109; M = 103 months; SD = 7.13), these children completed the Narrative Story Stem Battery (Bretherton, Oppenheim, Buchsbaum, Emde, & The MacArthur Narrative Group, 1990). In line with predictions, secure children depicted significantly fewer conflict themes in their narratives than did disorganized- controlling children. Secure children also produced significantly more discipline themes than avoidant children and had higher coherence scores than did ambivalent children. Furthermore, girls' narratives were more likely to evoke discipline and affection/affiliation themes, and to be more coherent than boys' narratives. These results suggest that attachment narratives are a promising way of evaluating internal working models of attachment during the school-age years. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prospective effects of interparental conflict on child attachment security and the moderating role of parents' romantic attachment.

This study investigated the impact of parents' observed conflict behavior on subsequent child attachment security, both as a main effect and as moderated by parents' romantic attachment. Participants were 80 heterosexual couples involving men from the Oregon Youth Study and their first-born children. The authors used hierarchical linear modeling to predict child security with each parent. Interparental psychological aggression predicted lower child security with father, regardless of romantic attachment. If the father was insecure, interparental positive engagement predicted lower child security with him. If either the mother or father was avoidant, interparental withdrawal did not predict lower child security, though it did for more secure parents. Results are discussed in terms of implications of attachment-(in)congruent behavior for parents' emotional availability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trauma, mental representation, and the organization of memory for mother-referent material

Research on the effects of child maltreatment and exposure to community violence suggests that children who experience these types of traumatic events may be at risk for alterations and biases in attention and memory similar to those that have been observed in adults suffering from traumatic stress reactions. Along these lines, attachment theory posits that representational models of relationships also may act as moderators of similar cognitive biases by selectively guiding children's attention to and processing of interpersonal stimuli. Building upon the trauma and attachment literatures, the present investigation examined the links among trauma, representational models of caregivers, and children's memory for mother-relevant information using an incidental recall task in a sample of maltreated (n = 71) and nonmaltreated (n = 102) children between the ages of 8 and 13 years. Results were consistent with the hypothesis that experiences of trauma and representational models of caregivers are associated with differences in the way children process and retrieve information about positive and negative mother attribute words. In particular, experiences of trauma initially were associated with increased insecurity in children's representational models. Moreover, the interaction of traumatic experience and security of mental representation predicted children's recall for mother attribute words: victimized children with insecure models recalled the highest proportion of negative mother stimuli. Trauma and mental representation did not have a consistent effect on structurally encoded aspects of recall. Results were discussed in terms of the ways in which children who have experienced trauma process information about their worlds. The importance of assessing functioning in multiple developmental domains when studying memory also was discussed.     

Relation entre l'attachement et les interactions mère-enfant en milieu naturel et expérimental à l'age scolaire.

The purpose of the present study is to examine the relation between quality of mother-child interaction in a lab and home setting, and quality of attachment of school-age children. A second objective of the study is to evaluate the associations between quality of mother-child interactions, attachment and maternal psychosocial measures (social support, depression, and parental stress). Security of attachment (Separation-Reunion procedure, Main & Cassidy, 1988) and the quality of mother-child interaction was evaluated for a sample of 38 children (mean age = 6 years). Mothers also completed self-report measures for depression, stress, and social support. Concurrent to the lab assessment, quality of mother-child interaction was also evaluated during a home visit. Results indicated a strong association between interactive patterns in both settings. Moreover, interactive patterns differed in terms of attachment classification with secure children showing the most harmonious patterns and disorganized/controlling children showing the most dysfunctional patterns. Maternal psychosocial measures were not related to child security of attachment, but mothers of insecure children reported marginally more stress related to the child. Maternal psychosocial adjustment was, in part, related to dyadic mother-child interaction in the home and lab setting. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Temperament, Relationships, and Young Children's Receptive Cooperation With Their Parents.

The authors studied receptive cooperation--a willing, eager stance toward parents--in 15-month-old children (N=101) in broadly ranging contexts. Children's anger proneness and parents' responsiveness (both observed at 7 months) and children's attachment security (assessed in Strange Situation at 15 months) were examined as predictors of children's receptive cooperation at 15 months. In mother-child dyads, secure attachment was strongly associated with children's higher receptive cooperation. Maternal responsiveness in infancy also promoted children's future receptive cooperation, but its impact was moderated by child anger: Responsiveness had a positive effect for children who as infants were highly anger prone. In father-child dyads, the negative effect of anger proneness on receptive cooperation with father was significantly amplified for insecure children. Mother's responsiveness and child's secure attachment to the mother promoted child receptive cooperation with the father, but there were no similar effects for fathers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment, attractiveness, and social interaction: A diary study.

To what extent are attachment styles manifested in natural social activity? A total of 125 participants categorized as possessing secure, avoidant, or anxious–ambivalent attachment styles kept structured social interaction diaries for 1 week. Several theoretically important findings emerged. First, compared with secure and anxious–ambivalent persons, avoidant persons reported lower levels of intimacy, enjoyment, promotive interaction, and positive emotions, and higher levels of negative emotions, primarily in opposite-sex interactions. Analyses indicated that avoidant persons may structure social activities in ways that minimize closeness. Second, secure people differentiated more clearly than either insecure group between romantic and other opposite-sex partners. Third, the subjective experiences of anxious-ambivalent persons were more variable than those of the other groups. Finally, the authors examined and rejected the possibility that attachment effects might be confounded with physical attractiveness. These findings suggest that feelings and behaviors that arise during spontaneous, everyday social activity may contribute to the maintenance of attachment styles in adulthood. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Les représentations mentales des pratiques de socialisation des mères et la qualité de l'attachement des enfants en début de scolarisation.

Explored the relationship between the perceptions of mothers' socialization practices and quality of attachment for preschoolers and students entering primary school. The perceptions of socialization practices were assessed using 2 measurement instruments. The first test involved the assessment of perceptions associated with educational practices and attitudes. The second instrument corresponded with perceptions associated with the establishment of a mother-child partnership, defined as the affective climate and sharing of responsibilities between mother and child during a cooperative task. The child's quality of attachment was assessed using the J. Cassidy and R. S. Marvin classification system (1992). Ninety-two children were divided into 2 groups according to quality of attachment (56 secure and 36 insecure). Social and demographic variables, such as the mother's education, family income, family structure, the child's age, and verbal skills, were statistically controlled. Logistic regression analysis revealed a link between the perceptions associated with educational practices and attitudes and the security of attachment. The discussion highlights the contribution of theory to the study of post-infancy attachment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment style and emotion regulation in dementia patients and their relation to caregiver burden

One hundred and sixty-eight patients with mid- to late-stage dementia and their caregivers participated in a study of the relation between patient emotional characteristics, dementia symptomatology, and caregiver burden. Measures included premorbid attachment style, premorbid emotion regulation style, and behavioral symptoms of dementia. The attachment patterns (secure, avoidant, ambivalent) of these elderly patients resembled those obtained in samples of younger individuals in terms of emotion regulation characteristics; however, the distribution of attachment styles was significantly different, with a lower proportion of ambivalently attached individuals in the present sample. In terms of the behavioral symptoms of dementia, ambivalent patients had more depression and anxiety than secure and avoidant patients; the latter patients experienced more activity disturbance than ambivalently attached individuals and were higher on paranoid symptomatology than securely attached persons. Caregivers of securely attached individuals experienced less total burden than did caregivers of both insecure groups. In regression analysis, attachment style accounted for the largest proportion of unique variance in the prediction of caregiver burden (8%); only 1 of 7 patient symptoms contributed a significant independent effect, namely depressed affect, which accounted for 4% of the variance.     

Mothers' attachment status as determined by the Adult Attachment Interview predicts their 6-year-olds' reunion responses: A study conducted in Japan.

Following a 1986 study reporting a predominance of ambivalent attachment among insecure Sapporo infants, the generalizability of attachment theory and methodologies to Japanese samples has been questioned. In this 2nd study of Sapporo mother-child dyads (N=43), the authors examined attachment distributions for both (a) child, based on M. Main and J. Cassidy's (1988) 6th-year reunion, and (b) adult, via the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). In contrast to the previous Sapporo study, children's 3-way or "organized" distribution did not differ from the global distribution. However, when the disorganized-controlling (D) and cannot classify (CC) categories were applied to the analyses, a high proportion of D/CC children was found. Comparable analyses for Japanese mothers, including the unresolved/disorganized (U) and CC categories, were found to deviate slightly from the global norm. However, turning from global distributions to mothers' AAI classification as related to their child's reunion classification, all matches were surprisingly close to those established worldwide. When, as is customary, mothers' U and CC classifications were combined (U/CC) and compared with the child's D and CC classifications (also customarily combined as D/CC), mothers' U/CC status strongly predicted child D/CC status (r=.60, d=1.50). Additionally, mothers' AAI subclassifications predicted child subclassifications. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Disorganization of attachment in relation to maternal alcohol consumption.

The relation between maternal alcohol consumption and infant attachment behavior at 1 year of age was investigated. Alcohol consumption was estimated by self-report questionnaires that were filled out by mothers over 30 years of age regarding the amount of alcohol they had consumed prior to, during, and following pregnancy. The attachment behavior of infants was observed using the Ainsworth "strange-situation" procedure. Infants were classified as secure (Group B); insecure–avoidant (Group A); or insecure–ambivalent/resistant (Group C). Additionally, a new classification of insecure–disorganized/disoriented (Group D), developed by Main and Solomon (1986), was used. The majority of infants of mothers who had consumed more alcohol were insecure in comparison with a minority of insecure infants of mothers who had been abstinent or light drinkers. The classification of infants as insecure–disorganized/disoriented helped to identify a large number of infants who were insecure in the group of heavy-drinking mothers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Verbal interaction in mother-child dyads.

Examined the verbal interaction of mothers and their children in mother-child dyads. Ss were 24 children (12 2-yr-olds and 12 3-yr-olds) and their mothers. Each child was selected on the basis of age and pretest results indicating nondelayed receptive and expressive language function. The mother and her child were given an assortment of toys, and the mother was asked to play with her child. Tape recordings were made of each session. Analysis of the mother-child dyadic data revealed that the verbalizations of 2 groups of mothers differed significantly. Mothers of the older group of children used more complex expatiations and modeled interrogations. The occurrence of expansions and direct imitations was not a function of age of the child. The verbal interactions of 2- and 3-yr-olds was significantly different in that 2-yr-olds produced a greater percentage of imitations with reduction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived social support mediates between prior attachment and subsequent adjustment: A study of urban African American children.

The processes whereby attachment and other social and cognitive factors contribute to social and emotional adjustment were examined. Participants were 56 African American children from low-income urban families. Attachment and sociability were assessed in the strange situation when children were 4.5 years old. Two years later, children were interviewed regarding their perceptions of social support and their attributions about others' intentions. Also assessed at Time 2 were child verbal intelligence, defensive response style, children's self-reports, and parent reports of child adjustment. As expected, attachment uniquely predicted perceived social support. Insecure attachment predicted self-reports of behavior problems and parental report of internalizing problems. Perceived social support was associated positively and significantly with viewing ambiguously depicted actions as prosocial rather than aggressive. Perceived social support was found to mediate the relation between attachment and adjustment. Results suggest that behaviorally mediated strategies for relating to caregivers in early childhood predict generalized social perception, thought, and emotion at later ages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Risk factors in infant-mother attachment.

In Exp I, 56 preterm Ss born at less than 1,500 g were assessed at 6 wks; at 3, 6, and 9 mo; and at 1 yr for avoidant, secure, and ambivalent attachment patterns. In Exp II, 109 Ss (aged 2–4.5 yrs) with delayed development due to Down's syndrome, diagnosed neurological disorders, and undiagnosed disorders were assessed in a strange-situation setting. In Exp III, 15 Ss with cystic fibrosis and 15 normal Ss (aged 12–18 mo) were assessed for attachment patterns. Data indicate that none of the medical problems had a significant impact on the child–mother relationship. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)