Attachment security and temperament in infancy and early childhood: Some conceptual clarifications.

Vaughn, Brian E.; Stevenson‐Hinde, Joan; Waters, Everett; Kotsaftis, Antonis; LeFever, Gretchen B.; Shouldice, Anne; Trudel, Marcel; Belsky, Jay

doi:10.1037/0012-1649.28.3.463

Cited by 86 publications

(69 citation statements)

References 54 publications

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“…The contribution of temperament to the construction of internal working models of attachment has been a topic of debate for many years. Vaughn et al (1992) combined several studies on the relation between temperament and attachment in children. One of the important conclusions was, "Although our data provide evidence of overlap between temperament and attachment domains, the degree of association is not high enough to suggest more than a modest redundancy" (p. 469).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Because temperament is seen äs an important brick in the building of personality, it is necessary to rule out that the internal working model of attachment is just a matter of temperament. Although an interaction between temperament and attachment is plausible (see also Vaughn et al, 1992), a large overlap between attachment and temperament would cause one to question the specificity of the concept and measure of the internal working model of attachment. According to Hazan and Shaver (1987), attachment experiences should find expression in one's attachment style, that is, one's way of forming close relationships with other adults.…”

Section: Purpose Of This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The Adult Attachment Interview and Questionnaires for Attachment Style, Temperament, and Memories of Parental Behavior

Haas

Bakermans‐Kranenburg

IJzendoorn

1994

The Journal of Genetic Psychology

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ABSTRACT. Relations between Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) outcomes and data from questionnaires on attachment style, temperament,and memories of parental caregiving behavior were investigated to examine theoretical and methodological specificity of the AAI. The participants were 83 mothers of 1-year-olds. No differences between the three AAI classifications (autonomous, dismissing, or preoccupied) were found. Correlations between scales yielded few significant relations, with the exception of strong relations between some AAI scales for experiences and selfreported memories of parental behavior. The self-report questionnaires for attachment style and memories of parental behavior were therefore found to be not suitable for obtaining Information about attachment working models äs assessed by the AAI. Furthermore, attachment working models appear independent of temperament.ALTHOUGH BOWLBY (1969) conceived of attachment theory äs covering life-span personality development, attachment research has focused mainly on the first years of life. The introduction of a Standard observation procedure for the assessment of attachment relationships between babies and their attachment figures (the Strange Situation: Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) led to an explosion of research in that area. However, halfway through the 1980s, George, developed the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), which enabled researchers to assess attachment representations in adolescence and adulthood äs well. In this interview, respondents reflect on their childhood attachment experiences and evaluate possible impacts of these experiences on their own personality and behavior. 472 The Journal of Genetic PsychologyParallel to the attachment classifications in childhood, the AAI coding system (Main & Goldwyn, 1985/1991 identifies secure and insecure patterns of adult attachment on the basis of three main classifications: autonomous, preoccupied, and dismissing. These classifications reflect differences in mental representations that are based on differences in the organization of attachment experiences. To stress the dynamic nature of these mental representations, Bowlby (1969, p. 80) called them the "internal working models." Internal working models are defined äs sets of conscious and unconscious rules for the organization of attachment Information and for accessing that Information (Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985).There is an important distinction between attachment experiences (primarily with parents) that have probably taken place in the past and the way in which these experiences are represented (the state of mind with respect to attachment). The AAI coding system provides measures for both aspects. First, the system contains rating scales for judging if, and to what extent, childhood experiences were probably characterized by parental love, rejection, neglect, pressure to achieve, and role reversal. Second, the representation of experiences is assessed by nine rating scales that discriminate between the autonomous, preoccupied, and dis...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Purpose Of This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Adult Attachment Interview and Questionnaires for Attachment Style, Temperament, and Memories of Parental Behavior

Haas

Bakermans‐Kranenburg

IJzendoorn

1994

The Journal of Genetic Psychology

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“…No other moderators were significant. Because of the restricted number of studies, we were not able to test the Vaughn et al (1992) finding that the association between attachment security and temperament was stronger in older children than in younger children.…”

Section: Association Between the Aqs And Temperament: Discriminant Vamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, the AQS as a procedure to assess attachment security should demonstrate discriminant validity; that is, it should only weakly be related to instruments that have proved to measure other constructs such as temperament (Sroufe, 1985;Vaughn & Bost, 1999). Although attachment behavior and temperament may be related, in particular with increasing age (Vaughn et al, 1992), the two constructs should at the same time be considered as conceptually separate components of the children's socioemotional development. From a behavioral genetics perspective, attachment security and temperamental reactivity have been documented to have different roots (environmental influences vs. heritability; see Bokhorst et al, 2003).…”

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confidence: 99%

Assessing Attachment Security With the Attachment Q Sort: Meta‐Analytic Evidence for the Validity of the Observer AQS

et al. 2004

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The reliability and validity of the Attachment Q Sort (AQS; Waters & Deane, 1985) was tested in a series of metaanalyses on 139 studies with 13,835 children. The observer AQS security score showed convergent validity with Strange Situation procedure (SSP) security (r 5.31) and excellent predictive validity with sensitivity measures (r 5.39). Its association with temperament was weaker (r 5.16), which supports the discriminant validity of the observer AQS. Studies on the stability of the observer AQS are still relatively scarce but they have yielded promising results (mean r 5.28; k 5 4, n 5 162). It is concluded that the observer AQS, but not the self-reported AQS, is a valid measure of attachment.

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“…In contrast, Sroufe (1985) has argued that while temperament must be considered an important contributor to the mother-infant relationship, temperament per se is unimportant in explaining the construct of attachment itself. Others hold a more moderate position (e.g., Belsky & Rovine, 1987;Seifer, Schiller, Sameroff, Resnick, & Riordan, 1996;Stams, Juffer, & van IJzendoorn, 2002;Teti, Nakagawa, Das, & Wirth, 1991;Vaughn et al, 1992), and in a meta-analysis it was concluded that infant temperament variables are associated with attachment status to a similar degree as is maternal sensitivity (Goldsmith & Alansky, 1987). Together, these contentions suggest that temperament may be a confound in studies exploring relations between attachment status and variables of interest.…”

Section: Nih Public Accessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Maternal sensory sensitivity, mother–infant 9-month interaction, infant attachment status: Predictors of mother–toddler interaction at 24 months

Donovan¹,

Leavitt²,

Taylor³

et al. 2007

Infant Behavior and Development

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At 24-months of age, toddlers (N = 62) and their mothers were observed in a free-play session to determine the contribution of (a) maternal sensory sensitivity to positive and negative infant facial expressions as measured in a signal detection task at 6 months (b) maternal behavior and affect, infant behavior and affect, and dyadic interaction at 9 months, and (c) infant attachment status at 12 months in predicting maternal, toddler, and dyadic measures at 24 months. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that over and above early maternal behavior, which was predictive of later maternal behavior at 24 months, sensory sensitivity to the positive infant expression at 6 months predicted maternal behavior at 24 months and sensory sensitivity to both the positive and negative expression was associated with later maternal affect. Infant attachment status emerged as the variable which predicted toddler behavior and dyadic interaction at 24 months. Keywordssignal detection methodology; maternal sensory sensitivity; mother-infant interaction; infant attachment status; infant facial expressions The current study examined mother-toddler interaction patterns during play at 24 months by tracing their development longitudinally with respect to the potential influence of early maternal sensory sensitivity to infants' affective signaling at 6 months, maternal behavior and affect, infant behavior and affect, and dyadic interaction at 9 months, and infant attachment status at 12 months. Interaction between mothers and their infants provides opportunities for infants' socio-emotional learning and reflects the quality of dyadic interaction. Developing synchrony between a mother and her infant affords the infant reciprocal exchanges that facilitate social, emotional, and cognitive growth for the child (see Harrist & Waugh, 2002, for review). Early social play is frequently mentioned as an important relational context offering affective exchanges in the form of face-to-face play and attachment behaviors (Stern, 1995), exchanges which are thought to impact the child's development of self and others (Harel, Oppenheim, Tirosh, & Gini, 1999). Aspects of these earlier social play interactions change as the infant becomes more mobile to include exploration of the environment and manipulation of objects, with exploration of toys in the company of the mother being an important setting Corresponding author: Wilberta Donovan, Ph.D., Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1500 Highland Ave. Madison, WI 53705; Lewis Leavitt, Nicole Taylor, and Jennifer Broder are also at the Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin -Madison Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered...

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Attachment security and temperament in infancy and early childhood: Some conceptual clarifications.

Cited by 86 publications

References 54 publications

The Adult Attachment Interview and Questionnaires for Attachment Style, Temperament, and Memories of Parental Behavior

The Adult Attachment Interview and Questionnaires for Attachment Style, Temperament, and Memories of Parental Behavior

Assessing Attachment Security With the Attachment Q Sort: Meta‐Analytic Evidence for the Validity of the Observer AQS

Maternal sensory sensitivity, mother–infant 9-month interaction, infant attachment status: Predictors of mother–toddler interaction at 24 months

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