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Portland State University , Department of Psychology

PSY 311U: HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

LECTURES 13 AND 14 NURTURANCE: Will It Promote Prosocial Behavior? Nurturance as permissiveness: NO Nurturance as sensitivity/responsivity: YES Attachment: A strong affectional tie that binds a person to an intimate companion; characterized by affection & a desire to maintain proximity Attachment theorists argue that infants have a biologically-based propensity to become attached to 1 or 2 primary caretakers Attachment (Cont): Develops over first year of life, progressing from indiscriminate responsiveness to any adult, to highly specific emotional bond to caregiver (research has emphasized MOMS) at about 6 or 7 months of age Evidence for Specific Attachment: Protest at separation Joy at reunion Maintenance of proximity, especially in unfamiliar surroundings or when tired or upset "Stranger anxiety" emerges at about the same time Strange Situation Test: A series of episodes designed to gradually escalate the amount of stress the baby will experience  Standardized laboratory procedure in which the baby is subjected to a series of brief separations and reunions with mom & a stranger in an unfamiliar playroom The most reliable & valid measure of parent-infant attachment Strange Situation Test (Cont): The most developmentally meaningful aspect is infant's orientation to mom upon REUNION following separation Child's behavior when mom comes back into the room is most important Babies classified into 1 of 3 groups: secure, avoidant, resistant Attachment Classifications: Secure: Positively greets mom (with smile or by showing toy) or approaches mom to seek comfort if distressed Attachment Classifications (Cont): Insecure/Avoidant : Fails to greet mom as she returns (by ignoring her outright or averting gaze) or starts to approach, but then turns away (basically SNUBS or AVOIDS mom)  Attachment Classifications (Cont): Insecure/Resistant : Seeks contact with mom, yet cannot be comforted by her (combination of approach and tantrum behavior) Attachment Classifications (Cont): These patterns of secure vs. insecure attachment in the Strange Situation assessed at 12 months... are predictive of individual differences in later development--as toddlers and preschoolers. Infants With Secure Attachment: Have better cognitive development Have longer attention spans Have better social relationships with adults and peers Are more prosocial Show more mastery motivation Mastery (Effectance) Motivation: A motive to display competence, master challenges, and affect the world around one A desire to have an effect on or successfully control the world of objects and the behavior of others Mastery (Effectance) Motivation (Cont): Probably innate (parents don't have to prompt or reinforce it) But individual differences depend on the responsiveness of the environment and the security of attachment Strength of mastery motivation influences later achievement Infants with insecure attachments (particularly the avoidant kind) have negative developmental outcomes Insecure Attachments Lead To: Noncompliance Low frustration tolerance More physical and verbal aggression More disorganized & deviant in play with peers; less sociable in peer group Insecure Attachments Lead To (Cont): Less enthusiasm when confronting challenging tasks Less persistence in dealing with difficult problems Less competence in problem-solving generally More negative affect, temper tantrums Insecure/Avoidant Attachments: This tendency to avoid mother on her return is presumed to reflect an underlying doubt (MISTRUST) about availability of mother to meet baby's needs Erik Erikson: TRUST vs. MISTRUST What Promotes Secure Attachments? Many studies point to the same key characteristic: SENSITIVITY/RESPONSIVITY Neither interfering nor rejecting Responding to infant's signals promptly and effectively Sensitivity/Responsivity: Through sensitive and responsive interaction, infant learns she can have an IMPACT on the world. She learns that stimulation in presence of the caregiver is not threatening. Sensitivity/Responsivity (Cont): In presence of caregiver, infant can tolerate excitement of new experiences, because caregiver is available when needed. Ultimately this TRUST in caregiver becomes belief in his/her own competence.  The Emerging Self: Rouge Test Takes about 18-24 months for infants to have an awareness of self as a physical entity with a unique appearance (self-recognition) and as a categorical self belonging to specific age and gender categories Toddlers with secure attachments seem better able to recognize self in mirror and know more about their names and genders Temperament: Biologically-rooted individual differences in early-appearing and relatively stable dimensions of behavior Temperament (Cont): A genetically-based pattern of tendencies to respond in predictable ways; building blocks of personality such as activity level, sociability, and emotionality One classification system: EASY, DIFFICULT, SLOW-TO-WARM-UP Easy Temperament: Characteristic mode of response in which the individual is even tempered, content, and quite open to new experiences These babies are cheerful, adaptable, and regular in their habits Difficult Temperament: Characteristic mode of response in which the individual is irregular in habits and adapts slowly--often with vigorous protest--to changes in routine or new experiences Difficult Temperament (Cont): These babies' biological cycles are irregular Show negative reactions to new people or situations and their reactions tend to be intense Often irritable or unhappy Slow-To-Warm-Up Temperament: Characteristic mode of response in which the individual is relatively inactive and moody and displays mild resistance to new routines and experiences, but gradually adapts Slow-To-Warm Up Temperament (Cont): Like difficult babies, they react negatively to anything new But unlike difficult babies, their reactions tend to be mild Temperament (Cont): Difficult babies are overrepresented later among children with behavioral and emotional disorders But problems later are NOT inevitable What is most important is "goodness of fit" between baby's characteristics & the parent's expectations, attitudes, and behavior Benevolent Babies: Overall, no gender differences in prosocial behavior Comforting declines in age for boys Helping, sharing increase in age for girls Benevolent Babies (responsivity to distress): Longitudinal study by Carolyn Zahn-Waxler and colleagues Mothers trained to become observers of their own & their babies' behavior when someone was distressed Mothers asked to report both events in which child had CAUSED distress & those where child was a BYSTANDER  Benevolent Babies (Cont): Some babies only 10 months old at start of study, others 15 to 20 months old Every 3 weeks a researcher visited the home to make independent observations, pick up tapes, answer questions, etc. Study lasted 9 months Benevolent Babies (Cont): Newborns show distress to another's distress Experiment on neonatal "empathy" Benevolent Babies (Cont): In Zahn-Waxler's study, youngest babies (those less than 1 year old) paid attention to distress of others Starting at about age 1, some babies actually try to comfort Attempts to help may be somewhat ambiguous Benevolent Babies (Cont): Modeling of motor, social, & emotional responses increases greatly during 2nd year of life Children are testing distinction between themselves and others Benevolent Babies (Cont): There is a sensitive period for prosocial development beginning at around 18 months Individual differences become increasingly clear between 18-24 months Between 18-24 months, behavior of caregivers is particularly influential What Kind of Child-Rearing Produced Benevolent Babies? What was most important was how mother reacted when her child was the cause of another's distress The most important factor was the intensity with which mother conveyed the message that her child MUST NOT HURT OTHERS What Kind of Child-Rearing Produced Benevolent Babies (Cont)? Caregivers who made it clear that they cared tremendously about their child not hurting others, and who portrayed the consequences of their children's harming others most dramatically, had the most prosocial children "Emotional Wallop": Especially important 18-24 months Power-assertive inductions Forceful explanation & prohibitions Explanations embellished with emotion, values, & high expectations regarding the child's self-control "Emotional Wallop": Why is it Effective? It is an example of respondent learning UCS = emotion in mother's voice CS = induction Benevolent Babies (Cont): What was the only other factor that was related to the children's prosocial behavior in response to another's distress? Modeling: the mother's responsivity to her child END

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