How Attachments are Formed in Different Cultures
Culture is the learned and shared behaviour of members of society.
Culture varies widely in different parts of the world and is
constantly changing rapidly overt time. Cultural variations occur in
many aspects of behaviour including child rearing. Due to this it is
likely that differences in the types of attachments formed will occur.
There have been three types of attachment identified by Ainsworth et
al 1978 from her ‘strange situation’ study.
1. Secure attachment
The infant prefers their caregiver over a stranger. The child will
cry when the caregiver leaves but will stop when they return.
2. Insecure – resistant attachment
Infants stay close to their caregiver before they leave. However when
the caregiver returns, the infant may show both approach and avoidance
type of behaviour towards their mother.
3. Insecure – avoidant attachment
Infants do not cry when they are left alone. When the caregiver
returns the child avoids or ignores them.
From Ainsworth’s studies she found that 70% of infants involved in the
strange situation study had secure attachments with their caregiver.
Of the remaining 30%, around 20% had developed insecure avoidant
attachments with 10% having insecure resistant attachments. This was
due to the fact that the majority of mothers were sensitive to their
child’s needs therefore creating secure attachments. The few mothers
that showed little empathy towards their child the more their child
showed an insecure attachment.
This study was conducted in the USA so the classifications of
attachment types were based on American children. The problem with
this is that psychologists have referred to the ‘infant’ and the
‘caregiver’ as a universal culture giving little regard to differences
that may occur in forming attachments in different societies. On
account of this problem Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg 1988 conducted 32
studies of 2000 infants which surveyed the results of the strange
situation in eight different countries. Although they found that all