Abstract
Attachment theory states that children learn to trust in their parent’s availability and support if they repeatedly experience that their parents respond sensitively to their needs during distress. Attachment is thus developed and shaped by day-to-day interactions, while at the same time, each interaction is a momentary expression of the attachment relation. How attachment-related behaviors of mother and child follow upon each other during interactions in middle childhood, and how these sequences differ in function of attachment quality, has hardly been studied up to now. To fill this gap, we analyzed the micro-coded interaction of 55 mother-child dyads (27 girls, 28 boys, mean age: 10.3) after a standardized stress-induction. Results reveal that all mother-child dyads show a loop between positive mother and child behaviors. This pattern is complemented with a loop of negative mother and child behaviors in low-trust and more avoidantly attached children: these children tend to handle negative mother behavior less well as they show more negative behavior and less positive behavior in response to negative maternal behavior. More anxiously attached children also show less positive behavior, but react positively on collaborative interactions. The micro-coded interactions thus reveal important insights that inform practitioners and advance attachment theory.
Highlights
According to attachment theory, children learn to trust in their mother’s availability and support if they repeatedly experience that she responds sensitively during distress [1]
This study proposed a micro-coding approach that allows to capture attachment-related interaction dynamics between mother and child in middle childhood, and investigate how they
Middle childhood attachment-related sequences differ in function of attachment quality
Summary
Children learn to trust in their mother’s availability and support if they repeatedly experience that she responds sensitively during distress [1]. In contrast, experience their mother as unpredictable, unavailable or harsh, are more likely to become insecurely attached. Throughout development, attachment is continuously shaped by the daily interactions of mother and child. Their behaviors in stressful situations are momentary expressions of their attachment relation [e.g., 2], where children may for instance seek support (secure attachment), overly rely on themselves. Middle childhood attachment-related sequences raden/en/research-council; C14/19/054 awarded to Eva Ceulemans). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
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