Cultural spaces of popularized psychological knowledge: Attachment parenting in Turkey

Abstract

The psychological concept of attachment is constantly evolving. Approximately 70 years after attachment theory was first introduced by John Bowlby in the late 1940s, the notion of attachment is still in flux with continually changing ideas of what it means to be a good parent. One path along which attachment as a concept is moving from academia to everyday life is the philosophy of attachment parenting which was first established in the US by William and Martha Sears. Ideas about attachment theory and attachment parenting are frequently accompanied by critical comments on “Western” cultures. This critical perspective on modernity, individualism, and autonomy is portrayed in the first part of this article. The second part traces attachment as a concept transferred to Turkey. Rather than studying academic work on attachment in Turkey, this article focuses on popularized versions of attachment theory which gain ground as part of the parenting philosophy of attachment parenting. This article analyzes parents’ blogs, websites, self-help books, fieldwork protocols, and interviews with parenting trainers and parents themselves. It focuses on how popular scientific use of attachment parenting in Turkey is accompanied by discussions of cultural identity, cultural values, and belonging. The article shows that attachment theory and parenting are used in quite diverse ways to comment on Turkish (parenting) culture, ranging from anglophile readings to more conservative appropriations of attachment theory as Anatolian education. These forms of popularizing attachment theory challenge the sociological concept of psychologization.