Attachment Theory in Childhood Development

British psychologist John Bowlby was the pioneer of attachment theory. He referred to the attachment as the ‘lasting psychological connectedness between human beings.’ Attachment refers to the relationship and bond between people. Bowlby believed that attachment begins at the infant stage between the infants and the caregivers. Ideally, children develop their first relationship with the parents or any other caregiver.

He also added that an attachment that begins at an early stage is likely to last for a longer time. Attachment theory focuses on the long term relationship and bond between people. Additionally, the theory holds that such bonds are achieved through specific steps (Cherry, 2019). In other words, Bowlby viewed attachment as a product of an evolutionary process.

The first stage is the pre-attachment period. At this stage, the child does not have any attachment to the caregiver. This stage takes place between births to six weeks. At this age, children are not aware of the environment. They tend to respond by crying and fussing. The children’s continuous behavior keeps the caregiver close. Regardless of the caregiver’s attention to the child, the child does not show any sign of a particular attachment. Such action is evident in children regardless of gender.

The longitudinal study carried out by Schaffer and Emerson revealed that there are various attachment relationships between infants and their caregivers. They used a sample of 60 infants to identify their responses concerning attachment relationships. The study also noted that children tend to improve on their relationship with the caregivers are they grow older.

The age of the infants played a crucial role in the differentiation of the types of attachment relationships. Many researchers have also studied various theories that explain human development and response to stimuli. Erikson’s theory of psychological development indicates that infants are less likely to develop a relationship with their caregivers (Fonagy 2018, p22).

The second stage is the indiscriminate attachment. At the age of three to four months, infants begin to distinguish between caregivers. They tend to develop a sense of trust in some caregivers. However, they still accept other caregivers, but they tend to prefer some to others. At this stage, infants tend to develop a sense of belonging to their caregivers.

The stage initiates the creation of a bond between the infant and the caregiver. For instance, children who are raised by their parents are likely to prefer being close to their parents than other people. Children develop a relationship with those who are close to them. They tend to pay attention to the primary caregiver. This stage continues up to seven months.

The next stage is the discriminate attachment. The third stage occurs between seven and eleven months of age. At this stage, children develop separation anxiety. They tend to resist when separated from primary caregivers. In this stage, they become anxious about the environment, particularly their primary caregivers. Also, they tend to avoid strangers. Generally, they develop a strong relationship with their caregivers. When they are around strange people, they tend to develop stranger anxiety.

The next stage is multiple attachments that occur between 11 months of age and beyond. This is where the children develop a close relationship with different people other than their primary caregivers. For instance, they start having a bond with the father, older siblings, and even grand.

Notably, this stage is marked by the multiple relationships that children make with those who are always close to them (Zeifman 2019, p1). They still tend to have stranger anxiety when left with strangers. Ideally, the life of every child is attributed to continuous improvements in terms of relationships and bonds. Therefore, Bowlby referred to the attachment as a gradual process.

Attachment is influenced by the opportunity and the quality of the caregiving. Those children who do not have a primary caregiver like those who are raised in orphanages may not develop an attachment to the caregivers as compared to those who are raised by primary caregivers. Moreover, how caregivers respond to the children can determine their response. For instance, children need to get attached to caregivers who responsible for their care. Therefore, caregivers should provide quality care to infants.

Attachment is instrumental in children’s social and emotional development. Research indicates that those children who develop secure attachment at an early age tend to have good self-esteem at adults and even old age. According to Abraham Maslow’s theory of needs, self-esteem is one of the crucial motivating factors that human beings need.

Self-esteem falls on the second last needs that people yearn to achieve (Fonagy et al., 2018, p37). After settling the physiological needs and security needs, people tend to need recognition and the desire to belong to a particular group of people and society.

As far as the emotional life of the child is concerned, such children are likely to develop self-control. Notably, human beings respond to situations differently. Some people are short-tempered, while others are accommodative. Despite the influence of personality, attachment plays a crucial role in children’s emotional life.

Self-control enables the children to behave responsibly with those who they are close to as well as strangers. For example, children who developed multiple secure attachments with their elder siblings and another family member would not engage in disagreements. Instead, they will be accommodative.

Due to love and care, attachment helps children to perform better in school. The cognitive learning approach holds that intrinsic motivation is one of the factors that boost children’s morale to learn. Children who have a strong relationship with their caregivers can quickly develop intrinsic motivation as a result of self-confidence. Having self-confidence, children can achieve their desires, including performance in school.

Attachment enables children to have successful social relationships. In life, social relationships are attributed to effective interaction between people. Social relationships are also based on trust. Attachment enables children to trust their peers and strangers like they developed a strong trust with their caregivers during the discriminate attachment stage. Attachment theory is practically evident in children’s social and emotional world (Wu and Parker 2017, p1030).

The greatest strength of attachment theory is the fact that it is used in healthcare facilities to create a sense of belonging to those children who are born in different situations. Attachment theory can be applied in such instances where children are born in prison. In such a case, the child is taken to primary caregivers.

In the long run, those children develop a strong relationship and bond with the primary caregiver. If the child does not stay close to his biological parents, he may see them as strangers. However, the child will have benefitted from the attachment. One of the theory’s strength is that it recognizes the importance of caregivers who respond quickly to children.

The theory’s weakness is that it lacks a strong theoretical basis to be argued on. Most theories depend on both scientific and theoretical assumptions. Lack of scientific influence renders attachment theory to be difficult to approve. For example, the study conducted by Schaffer and Emerson identified attachment between infants and fathers, mothers, sisters, and brothers.

However, they did not incorporate a robust scientific analysis to support their findings. Therefore, the theory in question is considered to be difficult to prove since it is based on theoretical assumptions. Also, the theory results in greater similarity in temperament for identical and non-identical twins. In this regard, the method would not be useful to twins.

The time in which the strategy is implemented should be consistent with the child’s development cycle. If the strategy is not implemented to the children at an early age, it may not be useful at an old age. In other words, the attachment should be done at an early age. For instance, children who have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder may not be in a better position to achieve the intended objectives of attachment theory.

Researchers argue that failure to secure attachment at an early age harms the children’s behavior. Such behavior is likely to affect the particular children in their lifetime (Heard 2018, p12). For example, those who have evil characters are said to have not secured attachment at an early age. Therefore, this strategy should be subjected to any child from birth to adulthood. They should follow the four stages to achieve the intended objectives.

Caregivers should be responsible for the implementation of this strategy. In the life of many children, mothers are the first caregivers. Therefore, they should incorporate the aspects of attachment in their caregiving. They should aim at teaching their children how to interact with the world. The bond that is developed between parents and children is likely to last for a long time.

For the betterment of the children, parents should take their time to take care of the children. If the children are left in the hands of other people, they are likely to develop a close relationship with them that their biological parents. In summary, parents should be responsible for the implementation of attachment.