Attachment theory

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The attachment theory ( English theory of attachment ) summarizes findings from developmental psychology and attachment research ( English attachment research building) together, showing amongst others that people have an innate desire, close and characterized by intense feelings relationships with fellow human beings. This conception was developed by the British psychoanalyst and child psychiatrist John Bowlby , the Scottish psychoanalyst James Robertson and the American-Canadian psychologist Mary Ainsworth .

Its object, and thus also that of attachment research, is the establishment and change of close relationships in the course of life. Attachment theory is based on an early mother-child relationship perspective that focuses on the child's emotional needs. It is taken into account, expanded and applied in the theories and concepts of psychoanalysis , systems theory and cognitive psychology and has made a great contribution to psychotherapy as well as developmental psychology and education .

Development of attachment theory

Charles Darwin , before 1869

One of Bowlby's original concerns was to create a scientific basis for the psychoanalytic approach of object relationship theories and to make psychoanalytic assumptions empirically verifiable. In the course of his research he distanced himself from psychoanalysis. The aim of John Bowlby's work as a child psychoanalyst and psychoanalyst was later to investigate the actual effects of family influences on child development, the various patterns of family interactions and the intergenerational transmission of attachment relationships. In the main features of his theory, Bowlby referred particularly to the ethology founded by Charles Darwin (comparative behavioral research), on psychoanalysis and pediatrics .

Fuel got the development of attachment theory out of the skepticism of its proponents about the viewpoints taken by John B. Watson in the late 1920s; Watson had warned against allowing mothers to pamper and pamper their children, thereby exerting an impact on infant education that was not broken until 1946 by Benjamin Spock's book Infant and Child Care .

In the 1940s

Bowlby formulated his first perspectives in 1940 in an article for the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, in which he anticipated many of the central ideas of attachment theory. He underlined the adverse effects of early parent-child separations such as B. Hospitalization of children without a mother. He published his first empirical study in 1944. It was a retrospective study that looked at the life stories of 44 young thieves. He met her as early as the 1930s while working in a home for boys with behavioral problems. He put forward the thesis that the impairment of the early mother-child relationship is a decisive precursor to mental disorders. After the war, J. Bowlby became the head of the Parents and Children Department at the Tavistock Clinic in London. There he founded his own independent research group. The main research topic at this time was the separation of mothers and their children. James Robertson , who worked in a children's home run by Anna Freud and Dorothy Tiffany Burlingham , had previously anticipated and documented his own field observations on this problem. He joined Bowlby's research group in 1948 and was given the job of observing infants in hospitals and homes that were rarely visited by their parents. He made the film A two-year-old goes to hospital . The insights from Robertson's film and field observations played an important role in the development of attachment theory.

In the 1950s

Mary Ainsworth, a psychologist, applied for a position at the Tavistock Clinic in 1950. Her responsibilities included research into the effects of early mother-child separation on personality development and was under the direction of John Bowlby. As she continued working with James Robertsons in the clinic, Ainsworth was so impressed by his field observations that she decided to adopt his methods.

Another impetus for the development of theory was the order placed by the World Health Organization in 1951 to Bowlby . He was supposed to write a report on the fate of homeless children in post-war Europe. In the same year, Bowlby gained new ideas and insights, among other things from an older article by Konrad Lorenz about coinage, which was first published in English .

Nikolaas Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz

Konrad Lorenz , Nikolaas Tinbergen and Robert Hinde investigated the innate behavior of animals. Bowlby formulated the hypothesis that humans are endowed with innate behaviors just like other mammals and birds.

In 1952, Bowlby and the Psychoanalytical Society in England came to an almost final scandal when, in the film A two year old goes to Hospital made by his colleague James Robertson , he showed a sad and sorrowful girl who had come to the hospital and there how it was common practice worldwide in the treatment of children in hospitals to be exposed to a massive loss of life in complete separation from their relationship and attachment figures. Bowlby's harshest critic at the time was the psychoanalyst Melanie Klein . This film gave important suggestions for the further development of the theory.

In 1953 Mary Ainsworth went to Uganda and first examined the Ganda people's separation reactions when weaning. In the course of her almost two-year field study , she expanded her focus of observation. She observed the onset and development of certain attachment behaviors between mothers and children between the ages of 15 weeks and 2 years. In 1955 she finished her work on the study and went to the USA . Due to her work as a doctor and teacher, she did not initially come to an evaluation of the observation results. It wasn't until 1958 that Bowlby and Ainsworth resumed their collaboration. The rich data collection of the “Uganda Study” became an important source for both of them to update the attachment theory.

In 1957, Bowlby's first official presentations on attachment theory took place in three highly controversial lectures before the British Psychoanalytic Society in London and their publication a year later in the Journal of Psycho-Analysis . In the same year, the still young attachment theory in the GDR received attention through an article by Robertson in the journal for medical training, and Eva Schmidt-Kolmer presented excerpts from Bowlby's article Maternal Care and Mental Health for the WHO in this journal . In the period that followed, at the end of the 1950s, extensive comparative developmental psychological studies were carried out in the GDR between family-bound infants and toddlers, day -care children and children in nursery schools and children in nurseries . The results of the investigation were able to prove the best levels of development for family-bound children with regard to morbidity , physical and psychological development and adaptation disorders when changing milieu .

In the 1960s

After the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, there were no further publications of attachment theory or comparative studies with family-bound children in the GDR. The previous research results were not published any further and, like the attachment theory, were forgotten in the GDR in the following years. At about the same time, attachment theory experienced violent hostility from the psychoanalytic side. Anna Freud (1960) and René Spitz (1960) openly criticized Bowlby for his opinions differing from Freud's psychoanalysis . During this time, his theoretical approaches received insufficient attention.

During this time he regularly organized meetings between well-known scientists from infant research (such as H. Papoušek, M. Ainsworth, G. Appell) and animal research (such as H. Harlow, C. Kaufmann). The first findings from the “Uganda Project” were presented here. Attachment could be related to close physical contact with the mother. The lively discussions that followed between the scientists also contributed to the further development of attachment theory.

Bowlby also took up learning-theoretical research that took place , for example, with rhesus monkey children. Harry Harlow had discovered that young monkeys seek physical closeness to dummy mothers who are covered with fur but not feed them - but not to wire dummies that feed them but are not covered with fur. For Bowlby, this refuted the classic psychoanalytic and the learning theory thesis that the relationship between a mother and her child is mainly determined by feeding.

Bowlby also referred to Charles Darwin in his work when he said that every human being is equipped with the systems of behavior that ensure the survival of the species . In the child, this includes so-called attachment behavior. In this context, he considered what evolutionary advantages or disadvantages physical proximity to or physical separation from a mother (or a group) could have for the individual. He came to the conclusion that the behavior is likely to be an evolutionary protection against predators. Even adults feel safer in unfamiliar situations around a caregiver or in a group. This is particularly important for young animals and children, as they would be particularly at risk if they were separated from their mother.

Mary Ainsworth continued her work on mother-child bonding in the Baltimore Study in the early 1960s, examining the interactions between mothers and children in their natural environment. She regularly visited families to observe the interaction behavior. She found similarities between Bowlby's ideas and William Blatz's "security theory".

Subsequent years to the present

Bowlby formulated a detailed version of the attachment theory in the following years in his works Attachment (1969), Separation (1973) and Loss (1980). Later research indirectly confirmed the attachment theory. Ainsworth was able to confirm the theory with the help of experiments. She developed an experimental situation in which different qualities of attachment behavior in human children could be demonstrated. Robertson made Ainsworth's attention to the different behavior patterns after reunification with his parents. Through his 1975 essay on the reactions of small children to short-term separation from their mother in the light of new observations, the interest in attachment theory on the part of psychoanalysis reawakened in Germany (West) too.

The attachment theory is now one of the established theories within psychology and has been continuously developed since the 1990s. In German-speaking countries, the married couple Hanus and Mechthild Papoušek as well as Karl Heinz Brisch at the University of Munich and Karin and Klaus Grossmann at the University of Regensburg should be mentioned. In long-term studies, the latter accompanied 102 newborns up to the age of 22. Many researchers examine the bond and interaction between parents and children and draw conclusions from this about normal and pathological developments. The theoretical foundations of attachment are also increasingly included in the psychotherapy of adults and children.

Basics of attachment theory

Makua mother with child

Binding (engl .: attachment ) is the name for a close emotional relationship between people. The newborn develops a special relationship with its parents or other relevant caregivers. The attachment prompts the toddler to seek and receive protection and reassurance from their caregivers in the event of objectively existing or subjectively experienced danger (threat, fear , pain). Caregivers or attachment figures are the adults or older people with whom the child had the most intensive contact in the first few months of life.

The attachment behavior consists of various observable behaviors such as smiling, screaming, clinging, crawling towards the mother , looking for the caregiver , etc. These behaviors are described as a behavior system. It is genetically determined and found in all primate children, especially humans.

Concrete attachment behavior is activated when you want to be close or in "alarm situations". The latter are accompanied by emotional stress , for example when the distance to the caregiver is too great, when there is discomfort, pain and fear. Rejected attachment requests reinforce attachment-seeking behavior, which can also be observed when a reference person returns.

Proximity to the attachment person with eye and / or physical contact for a short time usually ends behavior seeking attachment. The child feels safe and can show curious exploratory behavior (exploratory behavior). Here, the frequent reassurance through eye contact with the attachment person in young children shows how essential a secure attachment is for exploring the world and the later control of both poles in the sense of healthy autonomy .

Attachment behavior changes in the course of life. With older children and adults, the “original”, directly observable attachment and exploration behavior in the sense of approaching and removing attachment persons is no longer so obvious. Nevertheless, research based on attachment theory has found connections between early attachment behavior and the behavior of older children, adolescents and adults. Due to the individual differences in the parent-child interaction in the first years of life, according to Bowlby, the inner working models (English for "inner working / working models") are formed. In the course of development, these are represented relatively stable in the psyche of a person (i.e. mapped).

The inner working model contains the individual early attachment experiences as well as the derived expectations that a child has towards human relationships. They serve to interpret the attachment person's behavior and predict their behavior. After developing in the first year of life, the inner working models become increasingly stable. They develop into attachment representations. While the concept of attachment representation can be traced back to the psychoanalytic tradition, cognitive psychologists would rather speak of schemes , i.e. attachment schemes .

It is essential that the developing types of attachment emerge from the parent-child relationship and thus reflect an interpersonal quality into which the behavior of both sides flows. The sensitivity of the caregiver is decisive for the subsequent quality of the bond . Sensitivity is understood to mean that adult caregivers react promptly and appropriately to the situation to the expressions and needs of the infant. In this respect, the child's subsequent attachment behavior is less a reflection of his temperament or character , but primarily an expression of the interaction he has experienced with the caregiver.

The term interaction (synonym: interaction) is a designation for mutual behavior between people. In social psychology today, the term stands for any type of interaction or mutual dependency in a social context. John Bowlby first used it in his essay On The Nature of Mother-Child Bonding in the Context of Social Behavior. The resultant on the basis of the binding theory empirical research has succeeded, leading to the binding behavior of the early interaction behavior by means of the "foreign-Situations test" (see below) to be operationalized and thus empirically to make tangible. The sensitivity on the part of the caregiver has an influence on the quality of the child's attachment.

Attachment behavior develops in the first year of life. Up to the sixth week of life, the attachment person can change almost at will. Then - roughly at the same time as the first person-related smile  - an increasingly stronger bond with one or more people (e.g. mother, father, sibling or foster mother) develops. As soon as the child is able to move ( locomotion ), from the seventh to eighth month it is able to either actively move into the vicinity of the caregiver or to explore the environment independently away from him ( individuation phase ). This becomes possible due to the now growing object permanence , which allows the child the inner imagination of an object without such an object being directly present. From around the age of three, the child tries to influence the behavior of the other depending on the situation.

With the attachment behavior, the child tries to get consolation from his caregiver

Four-phase model of bond development according to Bowlby 1969:

  1. Preliminary phase: up to approx. 6 weeks
  2. Person-differentiating phase: 6th week to approx. 6/7. month
  3. Actual bond: 7th / 8th up to 24th month
  4. Targeted partnership: from 2/3 years

The individual attachment behavior / the attachment type of a newborn is created by adapting to the behavior of the available attachment figures. Here, the first six months of life are the strongest phase imprinting . However, a certain plasticity can be assumed: attachment behavior may change with corresponding experiences in the course of childhood and adolescence. Certain protective and risk factors affecting attachment (such as a secure attachment that emerges later in life or psychotraumas ) have proven to be important influences. In adulthood, it is considered relatively constant and determines close relationships later on. The early mother-child interaction thus shows the tendency towards generalization . In addition, research shows that the pattern of attachment has a transgenerational aspect: When they become parents, children who are insecurely attached are more likely than average to have children who are insecure. By means of specific test procedures, statements by expectant mothers about their unborn child can be predicted with a high degree of probability that the child will develop a certain type of attachment.

In the course of ontogenetic development, significant correlations were found between the quality of attachment at the age of one and psychopathology at the age of six. Recent research in the field also indicates significant connections between secure attachment and psychological stability or insecure attachment and psychopathological disorders (emotional disorders of adolescence, borderline personality disorders , anxiety disorders , impulse control disorders and addiction disorders ).

"Strange situation"

Exploratory behavior: Playing is more relaxed and trying out oneself more resolutely if the caregiver can give security

See the main article: Unfamiliar situation

In 1969, Mary Ainsworth and her colleagues developed the so-called strange situation, a setting for researching child-like attachment patterns. In doing so, they drew on earlier experimental work from the field of gestalt theorist Kurt Lewin , namely that of F. Wiehe on "Behavior of the child in strange fields" (late 1920s) and that of Jean M. Arsenian (1943) on Behavior of “Young children in an insecure situation”. Following on from this, Mary Ainsworth succeeded in making individual child attachment behavior observable in the sense of Bowlby's theory in a qualitative test situation. Here, 11 to 18 month old children find the typical conditions in an almost natural situation, which, according to Bowlby's theory, activate both attachment and exploratory behavior. The behavior of the child in the presence or absence of the mother and on her return is essential for the analysis of the attachment pattern. This is recorded with a video camera and analyzed with regard to the child's behavioral and coping strategies in the event of separation stress. Today it is possible to determine the bond up to an age of 5 years using the test procedure.

Initially, only three manifestations of attachment types were determined which can develop within the interaction with the attachment person: certain  (B), insecure-avoiding  (A) and insecure- ambivalent  (C). Later, in the course of the investigation of severely neglected children, the category disorganized (D) was added; the child's disorganized behavior could be associated with the impossibility of developing attachment behavior.

Types of attachment of the child

In a strange situation but also in other research constellations, certain types of attachment could be classified. The attachment behavior is very diverse and often individually different in shape. Today four qualities of attachment are usually mentioned in children:

Bond types abbreviation description Behavior in the test situation
Secure bond B type Such children have an emotionally open strategy and express their feelings. When the caregiver leaves the room, the children cry, scream and want to follow their caregiver. You don't let the tester comfort you. When the caregiver returns, they seek physical contact and want e.g. B. be taken in the arm. So they calm down quickly. They use their caregiver as a safe starting point from which they explore the room and also come into contact with the tester.

The hormone cortisol is released during stress. This situation means stress and thus a cortisol release. When the caregiver returns, the cortisol drops again promptly, since the stress regulation takes place through the proximity to the caregiver.

Insecure avoidant attachment A type The children show a pseudo-independence from the caregiver. They show noticeable contact avoidance behavior and are primarily concerned with toys in the sense of a stress compensation strategy . You seem unimpressed when separated from the caregiver; they do not show their emotions openly, but try to avoid expression. When the caregiver returns, the children ignore them. The tester is often preferred to the caregiver. Exploratory behavior predominates.

However, the situation also means stress for the insecure-avoidant child. Here, however, the regulation does not take place via the caregiver and the cortisol level remains elevated for several hours.

Unsure ambivalent attachment C type These children behave in a contradicting manner and clinging to the caregiver. During the breakup, you seem massively insecure, cry, run to the door, hit it and seem absolutely overwhelmed by the pain of separation. When the caregiver returns, they cling to them, but can hardly be reassured. Even in the presence of the caregiver, they hardly interact with the stranger. You seem to be torn between the need to be close to the caregiver and anger towards this person at the same time.

Here, too, the cortisol level remains elevated over the long term, as there is no adequate regulation.

Disorganized attachment D type The main characteristics of such children are bizarre behaviors such as freezing, turning in circles, rocking and other stereotypical movements as well as complete lack of emotion. These children do not have a behavioral strategy in attachment-relevant stressful situations to deal with the separation and reunification situation. Fear paralyzes, freezes and overwhelms them. The predominant feelings are powerlessness, overwhelm, helplessness and loss of control.

This is justified by emotionally contradicting attachment experiences that cannot be integrated into a uniform pattern. For example, the attachment person offers some emotional security, but is also sometimes the source of fear. This occurs, for example, if the caregiver is mistreated. The caregiver inflicts life-threatening violence on the child, but is also the only person caring for the child. There is a dependency on the threat and the child is thus in a paradoxical “lose-lose” situation; no matter what it does, it's wrong.

In these children, the cortisol level is permanently elevated.

Secure bond

The term B-bond has become established for the secure attachment of a child . Due to parental sensitivity, securely attached children develop a great deal of confidence in the availability of the attachment figure. This sensitivity in the parent-child interaction is characterized by the prompt perception of the child's signals, the correct interpretation of these and an appropriate and prompt reaction to these signals, which does not cause severe frustration in the child.

These children certainly cry within the "strange situation". They clearly show the feelings and even partially accept the comfort of a strange woman (a helper who is part of the test) in the room. Although the separation is associated with negative feelings even in securely attached children, they trust that the attachment person will not fail them or react incorrectly in any way. In such a bond, the attachment figure fulfills the role of a “safe haven” that will always offer protection when the child needs it. The children are sad that the attachment person is not with them - and assume: "She's coming back." If the attachment person appears in the room, the children are happy. They seek closeness and contact, shortly afterwards turn back to exploring the space.

Insecure-avoidant attachment

Type A attachment children appear to be unimpressed when their attachment figure walks out. You play, explore the room and at first glance are neither anxious nor angry about the attachment person's departure. However, through additional investigation of the children's physiological reactions during the situation, it was found that their salivary cortisol level rises higher when the attachment person leaves than that of securely attached children, who express their grief - which suggests stress . Her heartbeat also accelerates. If the attachment person comes back, they will be ignored. The children tend to seek closeness to the stranger and avoid their actual attachment figure.

Insecure avoidant children lack confidence in the availability of their attachment figure. They develop the expectation that their wishes will generally meet with rejection and that they are not entitled to love and support. Such a pattern of attachment can be seen in children who have experienced frequent rejection. The children can only find a way out of the stressful, threatening situation of repeatedly being rejected by avoiding relationships.

In Germany, in contrast to other western countries, a particularly large number of adults are positively impressed when children react indifferently to the disappearance of the caregiver. The parents perceive this as "independent".

Unsure-ambivalent attachment

This form of bond is also called fearful-reluctant, resistant , ambivalent bond or C bond . Children described here appear to be anxious and dependent on their attachment figure. If the attachment person leaves, the children react extremely stressed. A stranger is just as feared as the room itself. Even before the attachment figure leaves, the children show stress . Since they fear the unfamiliar situation, their attachment behavior is activated right from the start. The children react in this way to the correlating attachment behavior of the attachment figure: The attachment figure does not react reliably, comprehensibly and predictably for the child. The constant alternation of sensitive behavior and then repulsive behavior means that the child's attachment system must be constantly activated. It can be difficult to gauge how the attachment person will act or react in a given situation. The child is constantly busy finding out what mood the attachment person is in, what they want and what they need so that they can adapt accordingly. This leads to a restriction of the child's curiosity and exploratory behavior, who cannot concentrate on exploring the room. The children cannot build positive expectations because the attachment person is often not available - usually not even when they are around. Accordingly, they do not expect a positive outcome of the situation and react extremely stressed and fearful within the "strange situation" .

Disorganized / disoriented attachment

With this type of bond, the term disorganized bond or D bond has become established. The disorganized type of attachment was not discovered until much later. Mary Main , who also examined adults with the AAI ( Adult Attachment Interview ), Judith Solomon and T. Berry Brazelton , introduced the classification. There were always children whose behavior could not be clearly classified into one of the three main reaction schemes. Ainsworth and subsequent colleagues classified such children mostly within the safe category and a few as avoidable. After the introduction of the 4th type of attachment (the D-bond), a large proportion of these children were finally classified as disorganized / disoriented attachment type. Children whose behavior is mapped to this type of attachment exhibit extremely unexpected, unreliable behaviors. This includes stereotypes and unfinished or incomplete movement patterns . Disorganized children are often frightened when their parents re-enter the room after a brief separation and display a mixture of strategies, such as unsafe-avoiding and unsafe-resisting behavior. Some of the disorganized children cry out for their attachment figures after separation, but move away from them when they are reunited. Others react as if paralyzed with a dazed expression on their faces for 30 seconds, or turn in circles or drop to the floor when they turn to the respective parent. Still other disorganized toddlers appear anxious in the unfamiliar situation with frightened facial expressions, hunched shoulders, or freezing of all movements. Attachment theory assumes that a child build definitely a bond to its binding person needs . The attachment behaviors are activated as soon as protection and support are required or the attachment person is not around. However, the child could not develop a uniform attachment strategy to get protection and comfort: If the attachment person who is supposed to offer protection is both the trigger for the attachment behavior and at the same time represents a threat himself, the child gets into a so-called double bind situation from which there is no way out for the child.

Another reason for this attachment behavior can be seen in children whose attachment figures suffer from the consequences of their own psychological trauma. The traumatic experiences show themselves to the children in the frightened behavior of their attachment figures. The fear that is reflected in the face of an attachment person who suffers from intrusions (persistent penetration of the traumatic images and feelings into the thoughts / imaginations) is frightening for a child and activates his attachment system. The child cannot understand the source of fear. In such a situation, the attachment person is usually unable to adequately respond to the care needs of their child. For example, some mothers showed that all movements were frozen for almost a minute, or they showed that their children's neutral behavior was frightened. After all, the child constantly experiences the world as a threatening place, the horror of which is reflected in the caregiver. Studies by Ainsworth and Crittenden suggest a similar classification, which they described as ambivalent-avoidant (A / C bond) or unstable-avoidant.

Frequency and stability

Secure attachment occurs with a frequency of 60–70%, followed by unsafe-avoidant attachment and unsecure-ambivalent attachment with 10–15% each. The disorganized-disoriented attachment occurs comparatively rarely with a frequency of 5–10% (Berk 2005). In a study by Waters, Merrick et al. (2000) it turned out that 72% of the examined sample have a bond stability of at least 20 years. However, it is also pointed out that in cases where stronger relationship changes are experienced, less stable attachment patterns can be found.

Effects of attachment types on the further development of the child

Father with child: Children can develop an independent bond with several people

The attachment theory has shown long-term effects of the early attachment person-child relationship. Some accurate predictions can be made from the quality of attachment that was determined in the stranger situation test in the 12 to 18 month old children:

Securely attached children later show more adequate social behavior in kindergarten and school, more imagination and positive affects in free play, greater and longer attention, higher self-esteem and fewer depressive symptoms. In other studies, they were more open and receptive to new social contacts with adults and their peers than avoidant and / or ambivalent children. Securely attached boys showed fewer psychopathological features at six years of age than the insecurely attached boys . Early attachment experiences could also have a neurophysiological influence. Here, an influence of attachment experiences on the formation of the receptors of the hormone oxytocin could be found, which in turn influences the attachment behavior.

See also:

High risk groups

In high-risk groups, i.e. groups of mentally ill, severely traumatized or neglected children, various researchers were able to identify other types of attachment. This includes mixtures of insecure-avoidant and ambivalent attachment behavior. In addition, there were children with compulsive care behavior as well as overadaptation in the insecure-avoidant and aggressive threatening behavior and helpless behavioral strategies in the insecure-ambivalent attachment types.

Psychological measurement methods in children and adults

The attachment behavior could be divided into different attachment types of the child, as could be researched in the strange situation. The child tries to use these different strategies to regulate the emotional needs that are directed towards their caregivers.

What reactions the caregivers show towards the attachment behavior of the child, what attitude adults have towards attachment and how the cause of this attitude can be explained, is another interest of attachment research.

While attachment behavior is easy to observe in children aged 12–36 months, this is more difficult in older children and adults. The primary attachment behavior from approach and exploratory behavior can then no longer be observed. From the pre-school age, however, attitudes towards attachments can usually be found or it is possible to inquire about the inclusion of past attachment experiences in the personal life story.

In addition to the foreign situation investigation method introduced by Ainsworth, further interview procedures and specific test procedures for children and adults were developed in order to be able to assess the attachment in the course of life.

For research, attachment theory can use the observation of mother-child interaction as a means that can give an exact picture of the behavior of the attachment partner in the corresponding situation.

A test is available for children of preschool age and early school age, which uses predefined stories that are supplemented in the game to determine the child's attachment type.

The Child Attachment Interview (CAI) was designed for older children between the ages of eight and thirteen .

There are various self-disclosure questionnaires for adults, i. That is, they have to be answered by the person concerned. You work with three or four different bond types.

The cognitive and emotional attitudes of the adult interaction partners that lie behind the behavior are examined and evaluated in attachment research primarily with Mary Main's Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) . What is special about the test is that it is not the adults' descriptions of their early childhood experiences that are evaluated, but the coherence of the statements about this time and the current attitude towards attachment.

It is therefore assessed to what extent adults can logically and coherently report their past and current situation. It does not matter whether traumatic experiences were actually made, but rather through the coherence of the narratives it can be concluded to what extent the experiences of childhood are processed in the current situation. A brief, coherent and logical description of past experiences and current attitudes is considered coherent.

With the Adult Attachment Interview, a clear connection between the type of attachment of the child and the attachment attitude of the caregiver can be demonstrated. There are studies in which a connection between the attachment attitude of the mothers and the attachment type of the child was found in pregnant first-time mothers during the test. A prediction of up to 80 percent could be found between the statements of the expectant mothers and their classification of the “adult attachment attitude” and the developing attachment type of the - at this point still unborn - child. For this purpose, the children were assessed at a later point in time with the stranger situation.

From the Adult Attachment Interview, some classifications of the various attachment settings could be worked out. These were in turn related to the attachment behavior of children in the foreign situation. This research topic goes back to the concept of inner working models introduced by Bowlby, i.e. the psychological effects of attachment experiences ( see above under: Fundamentals of attachment theory ).

Adult attachment and the impact on the quality of attachment of their children

Certain classifications of attachment representations or attachment schemes that were found during the performance of the Adult Attachment Interview could be assigned to certain attachment types of their children, which were also examined in the stranger situation:

Autonomous binding setting

This binding setting, also English. Called free-autonomous , it is often abbreviated with "F". These attachment figures are described as having confidence , frustration tolerance , respect, and empathy . They are aware of the negative and positive affects and attitudes towards their own attachment figures and reflect on them in an appropriate manner and at a distance. There is hardly any unconscious identification with their parents - one's own parent-child relationship is viewed realistically and not idealized . Most of these parents themselves had caregivers with an autonomous attachment attitude or they maintained their secure attachment in the course of their biography through the possibility of alternative relationship experiences with other, non-primary attachment figures, through a partner or, for example, with the help of psychotherapeutic support.

These parents respond predictably to their children and can adequately respond to their children's attachment behavior.

Distant and dismissive binding setting

This binding setting, also English. Called dismissing , it is often abbreviated as "Ds". Adults with this attachment representation can barely remember their own childhood, which means they have repressed a lot . They tend to idealize their parents and their educational methods, although no concrete situations can be enumerated that justify this idealization . However, there are reports of a lack of parental support and rejection (openly or covertly) of the child's needs. The adults with a distanced-relational attachment attitude deny the significance of their own experiences with their parents and their consequences for the coloring of their current affects. They show a very great desire for independence and prefer to rely on their own strengths. They say that they have not missed the lack of help and that they do not feel anger or sadness in this regard . Children of these adults are more likely to count on affective support and attitudes towards their needs when trying to accomplish a task. The children are put under pressure to perform at an early age. According to the results of the Adult Attachment interview, these mothers like it when the children show attachment. However, they tend to ignore the child when they need reassurance and support.

Preoccupied, entangled attachment setting

This binding setting, also English. Called entangled-enmeshed , it is often abbreviated with "E". This attitude is often found in people who are flooded with memories of their own childhood and permanently burdened. They could not deal with the problems and difficulties within the relationship with their own attachment figure; they overestimate them and oscillate between feelings of anger and idealization. Ultimately, they are still in a dependent relationship with their own attachment figures and long for their attention and reparation. The mothers of people with this attachment representation were "weak" and "incompetent" in the most frequent cases and could accordingly offer neither protection nor reassurance in threatening situations in which their children activated the attachment system. If the mother (or the corresponding attachment figure) cannot remove her child's fear, there is increased clinging. The detachment processes in the child are also seen as particularly difficult because the “weak” mother often parentifies the child and it therefore feels that it has to look after the mother. Children of such parents are prevented from behaving exploratively and showing anger, aggression , defiance and the desire for independence through pampering and / or inducing feelings of guilt . This makes it difficult for children to develop their identity .

Attachment attitude influenced by unprocessed object loss

This binding setting, also English. Called unresolved , it is often abbreviated with "U". Attachment persons who are suffering from an unprocessed grieving process or have had unprocessed experiences of abuse or sexual abuse very often have children of the disorganized attachment type. The explanation is based on the assumption that attachment figures who suffer from trauma cannot offer protection, but relatively often activate attachment behavior in their children, as they show pronounced fear of a horror which the child cannot grasp. If the traumatized attachment figure maltreats, abuses, permanently embarrasses the child, etc., they do not become an authority protecting the child from danger, but a source of fear and danger themselves. Here, too, the children are often parented by their parents. Mothers with an attachment representation of this type allow their children to lead the relationship to an unusual extent. Generation boundaries are exceeded and the children feel it is their duty to look after their parents and to ensure their psychological and physical well-being.

Unclassifiable bond type

Within the studies on the AAI, it is discussed to create a further category for adults who cannot be assigned. This is usually referred to as can not classify (CC). This type of bond is characterized by:

  • In the AAI, the test person switched between distant and preoccupied attachment type without a clear strategy being discernible.
  • Most of the people examined represented serious traumatic experiences.
  • They often exhibited deeply negative attitudes towards attachment.
  • They had incompatible thinking and processing strategies.

Relationship between adult and child attachment types

As expected, the examination of both the parents and the children revealed statistical relationships which have the significance of the attachment representations in the parents for the development of certain attachment types in the children.

The agreement of the results is particularly high for the securely bound group. Autonomous parents have securely attached children with 75 to 82 percent. The other groups are slightly lower.

A meta-analysis was able to confirm the effect of the transmission of attachment behavior over generations.

The emergence of the attachment relationship and neurobiology

The neurobiologist and psychologist Allan N. Schore sees the formation of the bond primarily as a regulatory process between the mother and her toddler. He sees the development of the right hemisphere , which is dominant in the first few years of life, as an important development area that is influenced by the quality of the mother's regulatory processes. Here he sees primarily influencing the development of the orbitofrontal cortex , which has an important control function of affects and the understanding of interaction, but also the understanding of affects that are shown by a counterpart. The early interaction with the caregiver is important for the maturation of these brain regions.

The responsiveness , so the mother's reactions to their child, is crucial for the development of a secure or insecure attachment.

Modification of Bowlby's concept in recent research

On the basis of his empirical findings, John Bowlby strictly advocated the thesis that the relationship between the child and a central attachment figure (usually the mother) is constitutive for building a stable bond. More recent research has led to the view that children can develop this kind of bond even if relationships with several attachment figures exist at the same time.

This primarily concerns an appreciation of the importance of the father, but is also important in those constellations where, in the case of working mothers, there is a foster mother in addition to the biological mother , with whom children often develop intensive relationships. Here, however, it is observed that the child makes a clear distinction between the various attachment figures by assigning them different functions (e.g. the birth mother often remains the central attachment figure, to whom the child primarily turns when it feels bad ).

Interestingly, even very small children will be able seem to be that bond to a childminder in a day care center to be reduced to a functional aspect, provided them to their primary attachment figures a secure attachment have built. An indication of this assumption is the observation that securely attached children do not or only slightly change their behavior in the day-care center when they are dealing with someone other than their usual caregiver. Especially with the settling of the children in the first unusual situation in a day care center at the same time the accuracy evident from Bowlby's concept of a primary attachment figure: The settling succeed demonstrably better if the child is accompanied in the early stages of the mother or the father or another safe caregiver and is thus gently introduced into the new situation ("gentle replacement").

It was also shown that it is not the quantity of the relationship with one or more caregivers that is decisive for the development of a certain bond, but the quality. Bowlby assumed that the constant availability of the attachment person in the first few years of life is essential for the child to develop a secure attachment. The development of the bond does not depend on the constant presence of the caregiver, but above all on the developed quality of the bond.

Attachment disorders

Bowlby saw the prolonged separation of the child from their caregivers as the starting point for pathological development ( psychological deprivation ). This means times of several weeks, but at least two months. If the reunification with the caregiver takes place before this period, the disturbances disappear again and the child is able to catch up with normal development. However, there is a risk of hidden disorders that only appear later in life, such as B. an increased susceptibility to depression. In exceptional cases, even a shorter phase of separation can lead to permanent psychological impairments.

According to Bowlby, permanent separation from a person of attachment triggers a multi-phase mourning process , in the course of which the separation is more or less easily overcome. Moments of grief are the (unrealistic) search for the caregiver as well as aggression and anger, which are also directed at the lost caregiver.

The rooming-in , which is now standard in pediatric medicine in western-oriented countries, goes back to Bowlby's attachment theory - i.e. the possibility of the mother staying with her child during the hospital stay.

Attachment disorders differ from insecure attachment styles, which can be understood as an unfavorable adaptation that is within the range of the norm. In the case of an attachment disorder, stable patterns emerge that can be used both in childhood and adolescence, but are also important for adults.

One or more break-offs in relationships can lead to children generally no longer establishing a closer relationship or developing a highly ambivalent relationship to close relationships. In such a case, these children stand out because they show no attachment behavior at all.

In addition to the complete lack of attachment behavior, the "undifferentiated attachment behavior" is striking. This is also known as "social promiscuity ". These children do not differentiate between the attachment figures and show no reluctance towards strangers. They behave in almost the same way towards different people and strangers when their attachment system is activated. The “accident risk type” is also counted among these children. These children often injure themselves through pronounced risk behavior. It is noticeable that they often do not reassure themselves by glances at their caregivers whether the exploratory behavior is desired by them, is assessed as low-risk, is viewed with pleasure, etc. (" social referencing "). You do not develop an understanding of risky actions.

"Excessive attachment behavior" describes a strong clinging of children. They are only emotionally calm when they are in close proximity to their caregiver. It is similar to the insecure-ambivalent attachment style, but is greatly exaggerated.

In the case of “inhibited attachment behavior”, the children show an excessive adjustment, which usually loosens somewhat when the caregiver is absent. The children can then express their feelings more freely and openly. Through violence in their upbringing or the threat of it, these children show desire to bond with restraint towards their caregivers.

In “aggressive attachment behavior”, children open their attachment relationships through physical or verbal aggression. This is a form of expressing a desire for closeness. Frequently, the aggressive behavior decreases after a bond is established. Often family members are physically or verbally aggressive towards one another.

In the attachment behavior with "role reversal", the child shows itself to be overprotective of the attachment person and takes responsibility for them as soon as they signal this. This restricts the exploration behavior. These children often fear the real loss of their parents, for example through illness, separation, divorce or even death.

Attachment disorders can also take the form of psychosomatic disorders . In particularly severe cases of emotional neglect, growth disorders can be seen. Hospitalism has become known . Disorders in the parent-infant relationship can lead to eating , crying and sleeping disorders in the child . ( See also: regulatory disorders in infancy ).

Attachment disorders, especially the disorganized / disoriented attachment, seem to have an influence on the vulnerability threshold, i.e. the threshold above which a person can no longer cope with stress and develops a mental disorder . Insecure attachment increases susceptibility to mental illness. An assignment of insecure attachment styles and a certain psychopathology has not yet been established.

Developmental Risks and Psychopathology

After Bowlby and Ainsworth initially only examined the attachment behavior of "normal" children, research since the mid-1980s has also concentrated on the examination of risk groups. These included B. the children of schizophrenic or depressed mothers. In addition, parent-child pairs were examined in which there was evidence of abuse or neglect . “All studies agree that abused children are much more likely to be insecure than children of a comparable control group.” Another risk group seems to be very small premature babies .

Research has also been carried out on children diagnosed with certain attachment disorders (e.g. secure base distortion ) and children of traumatized mothers diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder . In addition, there are links between psychopathological disorders in adulthood and attachment disorders. This is especially true in the case of borderline personality disorders , agoraphobia , after sexual abuse trauma in childhood, in adolescents with suicidal behavior , depression , in vulnerability to psychiatric diseases, schizophrenia and in patients with torticollis spasticus . In addition, the influence of attachment disorders on psychosomatic diseases is discussed.

After the disorganized "D" (according to Main) or ambivalent-avoiding "A / C" bond (according to Ainsworth) was introduced as a classification, even clearer and more precise predictions about the attachment behavior could be made. Before the introduction of the new attachment classification, many more children who showed strange attachment reactions were classified as securely attached.

As a result, it was found, for example, that boys with equally severe abuse had to be classified more frequently in the more disturbed ambivalent avoidance (A / C) group than girls.

Attachment researchers found outside of the stranger situation in the observation of everyday care and play interactions that neglecting mothers stimulated their children little and reacted little to their signals, i. H. they did not enter into a "normal" relational interaction with them. Abusive mothers, on the other hand, usually tried hard while they had the most frustrated children. The interaction behavior had a controlling and occasionally irritating effect on the children. Mothers who looked after their children adequately and who had not been noticed for neglect or abuse were assessed as predominantly sensitive and flexible.

A research group found that mothers rated as negligible interact less variably and less “real” than normal mothers. They also spoke less in baby language . Mothers who were judged to be negative interacted more restrictively and less affectionately.

The fact that the infants were still rated as normal in their interaction in the first three months contradicts the view that difficult infants in particular are victims of abuse. Later behavioral problems should be seen as a consequence and not as a cause of the abuse. In this way, abused children predominantly become difficult, neglected children predominantly become difficult or passive interaction partners.

The subsequently created, special classification of the disorganized bond ("D" or "A / C" bond) often depicts traumatizing and / or highly inconsistent relationship experiences. In normal populations, around 15 percent are disorganized and in abused around 82 percent or more. But children from multi-problem families or from depressed mothers can also develop this type of attachment. For this reason, it is not possible to generally infer the occurrence of abuse from a disorganized “D” link.

Developing an unsecure bond is not in itself a psychopathology. The foreseeable consequences of an insecure attachment, such as less imagination in play or a shorter attention span, are of course not considered psychopathology. However, the insecure bond is seen as a disposing factor. If children with insecurity come from high-risk groups, they very often show great difficulties in social behavior and impulse control.

Some diagnostic manuals like the ICD-10 and DSM-IV incorporate the concept of attachment into some diagnoses. Attachment disorder as described in attachment theory, however, does not form the diagnostic systems. For example, in the ICD-10, the World Health Organization's diagnostic classification system , there are two diagnoses that are directly related to attachment:

  • Reactive attachment disorder in childhood (F94.1)
  • Disinhibited attachment disorder of childhood (F94.2)

The reactive attachment disorder describes an inhibited willingness to bond towards adults, which is characterized by ambivalence and fearfulness. The attachment disorder with disinhibition describes a clinical picture with disinhibited, distant friendliness towards various caregivers. Both disorders are attributed to extreme emotional and / or physical neglect and abuse. The listed ICD-10 diagnoses do not correspond to the superordinate explanatory model of attachment theory. They merely represent adaptations that are hardly applicable for appropriate attachment diagnostics in the sense of attachment theory.

Attachment theory concepts can be used as a basis for the following diagnoses of the ICD-10 :

Attachment research has u. a. dealt closely with the group of abused and neglected children. This resulted in the fact that "it can now be regarded as one of the best empirically confirmed findings in developmental psychology that abused children show a more disturbed, in particular more aggressive behavior when dealing with their peers than those who are not abused". These findings are confirmed for all of childhood . Research also found that the earlier the abuse begins and the longer it lasts, the worse the consequences are.

Constantly abused or neglected children show more problems with their peers and the teaching staff, in addition to the insecure attachment. However, neglected children are less aggressive overall. They are often more passive and withdrawn. With two to six years both groups show u. a. less empathy, react to the grief of others with aggression, are hyper motoric , cannot concentrate, are inattentive and give up quickly, are distant or suspicious and show less curiosity and exploratory behavior and are therefore less intelligent . The neglected children are most affected. They show the fewest positive affects and the least impulse control as well as the lowest IQ values.

Similar results are seen in adulthood. Adults with insecure / dysfunctional attachment relationships feel less socially accepted and are significantly more depressed. The consequences of abuse in adulthood through violence, substance abuse , alcoholism , suicidality , anxiety , depression and the tendency to somatization are also evident .

When women were interviewed who were victims of incest in their childhood , only 14 percent rated themselves as securely attached, whereas 49 percent of women in a control group rated themselves securely attached.

From the results of attachment research it can be said that certain forms of interaction can have a positive as well as a negative influence on later development. Neglect, mistreatment or sexual abuse have a particularly negative influence, which can often trigger or promote a mental disorder .

On the other hand, from the point of view of the existing research results of the attachment theory, stable, longer bonds are an important protective factor against mental disorders. Such a relationship can apparently also alleviate the consequences of traumatic experiences such as sexual abuse or mistreatment. In therapeutic relationships, individual resources can be used through catching up on attachment experiences .

Attachment Theory and Psychotherapy

John Bowlby was already considering how his theories could be applied in clinical practice. His therapeutic approach for adults who had to complain about the loss of an important attachment figure differed significantly from classical psychoanalysis. It consisted of experiencing the developing grief process with the emerging ambivalent feelings in the presence of an understanding psychotherapist. Bowlby also saw the therapist as a bonding person. In the case of children, he saw it as an important preventive measure not to separate them from their parents for as long as possible in early to middle childhood. If such a separation is inevitable, the children should be offered the most stable possible environment. However, Bowlby's approach has hardly been implemented in therapy so far; the attachment theory is above all a basis for research in developmental psychology. Bowlby himself suspected u. a. that his observations of behavior were too behavioristic to be of psychotherapeutic interest. Parallel to the attachment theory, however, psychoanalytic therapy also developed further by developing from one -person therapy to one that saw mutual relationships not only in development, but also in therapy. This view is based on empirical research on infants and toddlers as well as on psychotherapy research , each of which investigates the reciprocity in human relationships.

In a psychotherapy that includes the knowledge of attachment theory, the therapeutic relationship would enable a new attachment experience. By editing relationships, changing affects , cognitions and behavior, object relationships can also be changed.

reception

Attachment theory has been an established discipline in psychology since the late 1970s. It is also taken into account in developmental psychology, psychoanalysis, cognitive psychology and other psychological directions, but is now being expanded primarily with regard to internal psychological processes. It is not only the basis for various modern psychoanalytic theories, but is also an important basis for modern self-psychology , modern object relationship theory , relational and intersubjective psychoanalysis and the concept of mentalization .

The findings from attachment theory have influenced both behavioral therapy and psychoanalytic therapies. On the basis of the attachment theory, however, own therapy methods have also been developed, such as attachment therapy according to Karl Heinz Brisch , which combines psychoanalytic thinking with attachment theory.

The criticism of her essentially concerns the unclear role of temperament factors , which, in contrast to the characteristic of maternal sensitivity as the basis for the development of the attachment style, receives little attention. Martin Dornes sees the different results of the research, whether sensitivity or temperament are the causes of the attachment style, depending on the quality of the studies. The more precisely the sensitivity of the caregiver is examined in the context of attachment research, the sooner it turns out that it dominates in comparison to temperament. The temperament also seems to be largely genetically determined, but the bond is not.

William Sears , the founder of attachment parenting ( The Baby Book , 1993), drew from the knowledge of attachment theory in an eclectic way and without scientific claim .

See also

literature

Attachment theory

Binding and Family Law

  • Gerhard J. Suess, Hermann Scheuerer-Englisch, Klaus E. Grossmann : The divided child - comments on joint custody from the perspective of attachment theory and research. In: Family Partnership Law . 1999, H. 3, pp. 148-157.

Broadcast reports

Web links

Wiktionary: Attachment theory  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

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This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on September 5, 2007 .