Symposium 2003

Separation Anxiety and Attachment in Infants and Toddlers

by Marcia Braun


Introduction


Susie’s mother opened the door to let Molly, Susie’s babysitter, inside. Ten-month old Susie seemed happy to see Molly. Susie then observed her mother put her jacket on and Susie’s face turned from smiling to sad as she realized that her mother was going out. Molly had sat for Susie many times in the past month, and Susie had never reacted like this before. When Susie’s mother returned home, the sitter told her that Susie had cried until she knew that her mother had left and then they had a nice time playing with toys until she heard her mother’s key in the door. Then Susie began crying once again.


At a certain age infants begin to resist the unfamiliar and are very vocal in expressing their feelings (Brazelton, 1992). Sometimes this causes parents to hesitate leaving their child with someone unfamiliar to this child even if the parents know them well. It’s hard to leave when their young child is crying for them. They want him/her to be well taken care of and happy when they are not together.


From birth to about six months old, an infant doesn’t seem to mind staying with an unfamiliar person (Brazelton, 1992), although the infant is able to distinguish his mother from other people (Slater, et al, 1998). As the infant gets a little older, at about eight to ten months, he/she begins to cry when his caregiver is not his mother or father; and again between eighteen and twenty-four months, when the infant finds out he/she has some control over what happens (Schuster, 1980). Separation anxiety could, and often does, make parents feel guilty for leaving their child and might make them wonder if they are causing their child undue stress.


Separation anxiety has been studied for many years beginning with documentation by David Levy (Karen, 1998) in 1937 who was interested in “’maternal overprotection’ – the emotional impact of mothers who are anxious, overly cautious, and generally infantilizing of their young” (Karen, 1998, 16). His study involved several young children who had not had maternal care as infants and seemed unable to connect emotionally with their adoptive parents. He remarked that these children appeared to be suffering from “primary affect hunger,” which Levy defined as not only a hunger for affection, but for all the emotions that come with interacting with a mother every day. He asked the question “Is it possible that there results a deficiency disease of the emotional life, comparable to a deficiency of vital nutritional elements within the developing organism?” (Karen, 1998, 17).


In the early days of child psychology, one of the current thoughts on the development of infants was the eugenics movement where it is believed that genes play the most important role in how a person will turn out. Arnold Gesell believed that a child’s environment has an influence on how he/she expresses him/herself, but that genetics is the main determinant of their behavior. Gesell also believes that human beings develop through many stages. Thus if your child is misbehaving, don’t worry he is “just going through a stage; he’ll outgrow it.” (Schuster, 1980, 19).


John B. Watson’s behaviorism theory states that children are “products of their environment, pieces of clay” and children are shaped by their parents and society. In his 1928 book on raising children, Watson wrote, “Treat them as though they were young adults. Dress them, bathe them with care and circumspection. Let your behavior always be objective and kindly firm. Never hug and kiss them, never let them sit on your lap. If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say goodnight. Shake hands with them in the morning. Give them a pat on the head if they have made an extraordinary good job of a difficult task” (Karen, 1998, 5).


Freud believed that a person’s emotions are formed in infancy and the early years of life and he attempted to find a way to make a connection between these years and a person’s personality when older. However, he attributed much of his theory of attachment to instinctual drives. His understanding of an infant is of a “narcissistic organism who attaches to those others whom he perceives as persons who can reduce his tensions and thus meet his needs (Schuster, 1980, 186). And Freud regarded infant’s separation anxiety as a “key problem” (Bowlby, 1979, 121).


But John Bowlby (1979) was convinced that there was more to infants than being just a “piece of clay”. He believed that a human infant was more complex than what the other theories indicated. Bowlby believed that infant attachment behavior is conceived as any form of behavior that results in a person attaining or retaining proximity to some other differentiated and preferred individual, who is usually conceived as stronger and/or wiser. Whilst especially evident during early childhood, attachment behavior is held to characterize human beings from the cradle to the grave. It includes crying and calling, which elicit care, following and clinging, and also strong protest should a child be left alone or with strangers. With age the frequency and the intensity with which such behavior is exhibited diminish steadily. Nevertheless, all these forms of behavior persist as an important part of man’s behavioral equipment (1979, 129).


Three patterns of attachment were identified with regard to behaviors of the child toward the mother/caregiver. One style is classified as secure. This is where the child appears to feel comfortable exploring a short distance from the caregiver, may be upset if the caregiver leaves, is welcoming when she returns, and comes to her when the he/she needs comfort and shows confidence that his physical and emotional needs will be met. The anxious/ambivalent/resistant style shows the child to be preoccupied with the caregiver, wants contact and at the same time resists contact with the caregiver, could either show anger or passivity. And the insecure/avoidant style is where the child appears to be comfortable exploring the area, doesn’t feel necessary to pay a lot of attention to the caregiver, and doesn’t show a lot of distress when the caregiver leaves or joy when the caregiver returns. In other words, the child displays an emotional separation from the caregiver (Weger, et al, 2002; Berger, 2000).

Bowlby also differed from others in that he believed separation anxiety is a natural childhood reaction. It is a fear, not unlike the fear of the dark, loud noises, and strange things and people (1979).


In the early 1950s, Bowlby hired an assistant named Mary Ainsworth to help with his studies of infants. In time, Ainsworth began to ask the same questions as Bowlby regarding infant-mother attachment and the development of infants and wanted to study families using direct observation in their natural environment (Ainsworth, 1978.) And in 1954, while Ainsworth was in Uganda, she got her chance.


In Ainsworth’s longitudinal study of 28 Ugandan unweaned infants, she attempted to discover how these attachments take place. She spent time with each of the individual families (Karen, 1999), observing all activities that took place in their homes, taking special care to document the interactions that took place between the mother and her child. She observed behaviors in the infants at different ages and came to the conclusion that attachment is “influenced by the continuous feedback between infant and caretaker” (Schuster, et al, 1980, 186). Ainsworth noticed infants expressed smiles and babblings toward their own mothers that were different than those made toward other people. She also observed that a mother could quiet her crying baby when no other person could, that a child would cry when its mother would leave the room and seek comfort from the mother when frightened, and when the mother was present would feel comfortable exploring as long as the mother was in sight (Ainsworth, 1978). Ainsworth noted, “The mother seems to provide a secure base from which these excursions can be made without anxiety” (Karen, 1998, 136).


In her Uganda study, Ainsworth found that the ages that these phases of attachment took place varied among the infants she observed. And there were several infants that did not become attached to their mothers, or were not attached in the same ways that the majority of the infants were (Karen 1998). This caused Ainsworth to question what events or circumstances would cause the differences in attachment styles.


When Ainsworth returned to the United States in 1978 she did a follow-up study in a more structured setting to observe attachment behavior in infants at one year of age. Ainsworth set up a room with toys and ample room to play. There was an adjoining room with a one-way mirror so that the researchers could observe the child without being seen. The study contained two brief mother-infant separations and reunions which created stress for the infant. Ainsworth used this “strange situation” to observe infants’ attachment behavior, which she categorized as secure or insecure (Ainsworth, 1978; Booth, 2002; Karen, 1998).
When stressed, secure infants seek comfort from their mothers, which is effective and permits the infant to return to play. Insecure infants tend to show little overt distress and turn away from or ignore the mother on reunion; or they are distressed and angry but are ambivalent about contact, which does not effectively comfort and allow the children to return to play; or they exhibit disoriented or disorganized behavior” (Booth, 2002, 21).


Additional studies are indicating that it is important for the infant to form attachments to at least one significant person and that person doesn’t have to be someone who has a caretaking role (Rutter, 1972). There can be more than one person attached to the infant, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be the mother, but there should be not many more than three or four (Rutter, 1972). Some studies have indicated that when both parents are employed and the infant spends a significant time away from the mother, the attachment that forms between the mother and infant is more dependent on the mother’s attitude toward working and leaving the infant with a caregiver. For instance, some studies suggest if the mother experiences distress at leaving her infant while working, she may be motivated to spend more time interacting with her child during the time that she is at home; (Booth, 2002) and others have determined that maternal stress frequently leads to distress and depression. If the mother feels that she is able to be both a good mother and employee, she is more likely to have more positive “child-rearing experiences and outcomes” (Harrison, 2002).


Studies have suggested that for children up to age three who are in a day care situation, the more hours per week that day care is provided, a small reduction in social interaction, slightly less maternal sensitivity, and less mother-child interaction on the part of the child occurs. However, this didn’t seem to make any significant difference in the attachment security to the mother (Booth, 2002). And mother’s who work part-time experience higher levels of self-esteem, less stress and feel that their working has a positive effect on their relationship with their children (Harrison, 2002).


Other factors that have been correlated to positive attachment are the socioeconomic status of the family, marital quality, the emotional well-being of the mother, a mother’s sensitivity towards her child, an older, more mature mother, a satisfactory social support system for the mother, and the child’s temperament (Harrison, 2002).


When plans are made to leave a child with someone other than his/her caregiver, it is important that he/she is told about what is going to take place. Even if he/she becomes upset and protests loudly, when the event does take place, he/she will be able to predict it and will not be taken by surprise even though he/she cannot control the situation (Schuster, 1980).


The Question


When an infant cries while being left in the care of someone other than a parent, for even a short period of time, is it a normal developmental and age related behavior? My expectation is that I will find that the infants and toddlers under the age of nine months in my study will not show separation anxiety when the parents drop them off. The infants and toddlers nine months old and older will show signs of separation anxiety, such as crying and reaching for the parent who dropped him off.


The Method


The type of research that I undertook was an observational study of infants and toddlers ages three months to three years old. I received verbal permission from the director of the Christian Education Board of a local church to sit in the back of the room and observe as parents dropped off their children for care during the church service on Sunday morning and again on Wednesday evening during the church classes. I used a form to document my observations. (See Appendix A.) As the parents handed their infant to a nursery worker, or brought their toddler into the room I noted the child’s name, age, and the reaction of the child as the parent released their child and left the area. The children’s names have been changed on the form submitted with this report. Actual names were used during the study to prevent duplication of recorded information.


Some of the things that I looked for were the children’s emotional state as they approached the room by observing their facial expressions and any variation in that expression as they were dropped off. It should be noted that all of the children that were observed on these two occasions are regular attendees of the nursery and two-year-old programs of this church, and thus are possibly familiar with the caregivers.


I noted on the form the emotion expressed by the child in the space allotted and made additional notes following that. There were four categories by which the observations were scored. The first was if the child was asleep, and remained sleeping when dropped off. The second was if the child had no reaction and appeared to remain in the same emotional state as before. The third was an expression of fear or displeasure, but recovered to a satisfied state within the first minute (as evidenced by the child’s expression). And the fourth category indicated if the child showed signs of extreme displeasure, by crying, screaming, reaching out to the parent, and/or kicking.


The Results

The results of the study suggest that through the age of eight months, the most common reaction when left with a caregiver other than a parent is to remain sleeping (50% of the infants). At age nine months, the infants began to recognize the parent’s separation from the baby’s field of vision, with 60% showing slight displeasure. There were then 75% of the infants aged between 19 and 24 months expressing slight displeasure, showing an increase in separation anxiety behaviors. For those older than 24 months, 66% of the infants had no reaction to being left and 33% displayed extreme displeasure. The results were consistent with my hypothesis that the instances of separation anxiety would begin at approximately age nine months.


Conclusion


It appears that to the degree that a mother is sensitive and responsive to her infant the more secure the infant’s attachment is to her. And “the security of this attachment, in turn, is important because it predicts children’s subsequent peer relations, affect regulation, self-esteem, ego resiliency, and behavior problems” (Booth, et al, 2002). In addition, the responses that a child gives upon separation are positive indicators of the child’s desire to be involved in what is going on around him or her (Schuster, 1980).
Bowlby states that
human beings of all ages are happiest and able to deploy their talents to best advantage when they are confident that, standing behind them, there are one or more trusted persons who will come to their aid should difficulties arise. The person trusted, also known as an attachment figure can be considered as providing his (or her) companion with a secure base from which to operate (1972, 103).
Thus it appears that separation anxiety is quite a normal and important occurrence in an infant’s attachment development, an event that should be celebrated.
Bibliography
Ainsworth, M., Blehar, M., Waters, E., and Wall, S., (1978). Patterns of Attachment. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Berger, K.S., (2000). The developing Person Through the Life Span. New York: Worth Publishers.
Booth, C. L., Clarke-Stewart, K. A., Vandell, D. L., McCartney, K., and Tresch Owen, M., (February 2002). Child-Care Usage and Mother-Infant “Quality Time,” Journal of Marriage and Family, 64: 16-26
Bowlby, J., (1979). The Making and Breaking of Affectional Bonds. London, England: Tavistock Publications Limited.
Brazelton, T. B., (1992). touchpoints. Reading, Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company.
Harrison, L. J. and Ungerer, J. A., (2002). Maternal Employment and Infant-Mother Attachment Security at 12 Months Postpartum. Developmental Psychology, Vol. 38, No. 5, 758-773.
Karen, R., (1998). Becoming Attached: First Relationships and How They Shape Our Capacity to Love. New York: Oxford Press.
Rutter, M., (1972). Maternal Deprivation, Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, LTD.
Schuster, C. S., and Ashburn, S. S., (1980). The Process of Human Development: A Holistic Approach. Boston: Little, Brown and Company Inc.
Slater, A., and Muir, D., (1998). The Blackwell Reader in Developmental Psychology. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, Ltd.
Weger Jr., H. and Polcar, L. E., (2002). Attachment Style and Person-Centered Comforting. Western Journal of Communication, 66(1) (Winter 2002), 84-103.

APPENDIX A
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3. I have made corrections resulting from the reading done by the outside critic(s).
4. I consulted the Brown Paper.
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