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Model essay research into cultural variations of attachment
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16/16 essay describing van Ijzendoorn's study, analysing cultural variations of attachment
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Describe and evaluate research into cultural variations in attachment. 16 marksVan Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg’s meta-analysis (1988) of 32 strange situation studies across 8
different countries wanted to asses if attachment was universal or culturally bound. The meta
analysis included studies from 8 different countries, with a mixture of individualistic (e.g USA) and
collectivist cultures (e.g. Japan). Overall, they found a similar spread of attachment types as
Ainsworth’s original study, (67% secure, 21% insecure avoidant, 12% insecure resistant). Secure
attachment was most common for all countries, suggesting that it is in fact the most healthy
attachment type. However, this percentage varied, ranging from 75% in the UK (individualistic) to
50% in China (collectivist at the time). Collectivist countries(Japan and Israel) also had higher
proportions of insecure resistant attachments (29% in Israel compared to 3% in the UK) and lower
insecure avoidant attachments- Germany had the highest. However most interestingly the greatest
variation was found within one country rather than between (1.5x greater), with one US study
having 90% secure attachment and another with 46%. Overall, the meta analysis does suggest
attachment is universal, and supports Bowlby’s idea that attachment is innate and universal.
Unfortunately, despite its aim to uncover cultural variations, Van Ijzendoorn’s study had a biased
sample. It’s large sample of almost 2000 under 2 year olds and their mothers, while increasing the
generalisability in one sense, is over representative of individualistic cultures, with 27 of the 32
studies from individualistic countries (and 18 of these from the US alone) and only 5 from collectivist
countries ( comparatively only 1 from China). This large bias means that the collectivist samples are
likely to be less representative, and therefore lower the population validity, a large flaw in this study.
Furthermore, the imposed etic of using a US based procedure to test other countries means that the
data is not always represented appropriately. Mary Ainsworth’s Strange situation was created in the
US based on the US’s western norms and values of childhood. Using this to label children of other
cultures, and indeed say they are the ‘wrong’ attachment type, is highly flawed. For example, in
Germany, a country which values independence, the highest rate on insecure-avoidant attachment
was recorded- but this doesn’t mean that they have less good attachments, they just value different
traits. Unfortunately, the cross-cultural validity for this study is also low.
Finally, it has been argued that Van Ijzendoorn was testing countries not cultures . He compared
results from major countries but failed to realise that most countries have many different cultures
and subcultures within them. Researchers in Japan have found that while attachments in Urban
Tokyo have had very similar proportions to that of the US, in more rural areas they found higher
insecure-resistance, because of the 2 very different cultures. Van Ijzendoorn has failed in measuring
what he intended to, which can be seen in the fact variations within countries were larger than
between them, because of the different subcultures within them. We must exercise caution in
assuming an individual sample is representative of a particular culture- it is safe to say that Van
Ijzendoorn has lost significant validity in his study.
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Temperament hypothesis
Lagan criticised Dd
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