Mothers, attachment and insecurity

Attachment theory stresses the importance of the bonds a child forms with its mother during infancy - something seen as increasingly important by psychologists. Jude Cassidy from the University of Maryland traced 26 adults in Pittsburgh whose mothers had taken part in a study 40 years earlier. The mothers were asked to rate their one-month old babies on factors such as crying, spitting, sleeping, feeding and predictability and then do the same for the 'average baby.' Twelve of the participants had been rated more negatively than the average baby by their mothers and three quarters of them were classified as 'insecurely attached' in adulthood after being interviewed by the researchers. Of the 14 babies who had been positively perceived by their mothers only two were classified as 'insecurely attached.' Insecure attachment can lead to ongoing problems forming healthy emotional attachments to other people.

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http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/03/thirty-years-on-babies-judged.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BpsResearchDigest+%28BPS+Research+Digest%29&utm_content=Google+Reader