Attachment – The Strange Situation

Courses Info

THE STRANGE SITUATION – Ainsworth and Bell (1970)

This study was a controlled observation – consisting of 100 middle classed American infants and their mothers – where the quality of the child’s attachment was assessed through a set of pre-determined activities.

Separation anxiety – the unease an infant shows when they are left by the caregiver; the infant’s willingness to explore
Stranger anxiety – the infant’s response to the presence of a stranger
Reunion behaviour – the way a caregiver was greeted by the infant, on return

Infants are willing to explore
They display low stranger anxiety
Infants are unconcerned by separation and avoid contact at the return of their caregiver.
Caregiver is indifferent to the needs of the infant
Infants have an ‘I don’t care’ attitude

Infants are unwilling to explore
They have high stranger anxiety
Infants are upset by separation and reject contact at the return of their caregiver
Caregivers are ambivalent to infant’s needs, demonstrating simultaneous opposite feelings and behaviours
Infants display an ‘I don’t trust you’ attitude

The mother and the infant go into the room to become familiar with it before the observation begins; they continue to explore the surroundings
While the mum is in the room, the stranger enters
The mum then leaves the room, and the stranger interacts with the baby
The mum returns (reunion behaviour is recorded)
After the mum and the stranger leave the room, the infant is left alone (separation protest is recorded)
Instead of the mum, the stranger now returns (stranger anxiety is recorded)
The mum re-enters the room and the stranger leaves (Reunion behaviour is recorded)

The study shows that there are significant individual differences between infants
Most American children are attached
There appears to be a distinct association between the mother’s behaviour and the infant’s attachment type

STRENGTHS	WEAKNESSES
–Efficient – able to measure a lot of behaviours quite quickly, and bring in several participants	–Lacks validity – the location is different from a ‘normal’ environment
–Reliable – the study is easy to replicate	–Not generalisable – unrealisable to generalise the findings to a large population as the study only observed a sample of middleclass Americans (Ethnocentric)
–Applicable – findings can be used to develop counselling for middleclass Americans who find it difficult to provide good care for their child	–Not applicable – only applicable to middle class Americans
	–Ethics – infants were found to be distressed during periods of the observation Was the mother formed about the distress that their child would experience?

Q1) Describe and evaluate Ainsworth’s work on attachment (16 marks)

Q2) Some people say Ainsworth’s studies lacked validity. Explain this criticism (4 marks)

Q3) Explain how Ainsworth studied infants’ attachment using the ‘strange situation’ (5 marks)

Q4) Explain how a psychologist could investigate insecure attachment using Ainsworth’s Strange Situation (4 marks)

Q5) Briefly explain why some infants show characteristics of secure attachment, and some show characteristics of insecure attachment (2 marks)

Q6) Describe the limitations of using the Strange situation to assess the type of attachment in young children (4 marks)