Infants' affective responses in the strange situation: effects of prematurity and of quality of attachment.

: 20 full-term and 20 preterm infants and their mothers were videotaped in the Strange Situation, and the security of their attachment relationships was later determined. Each episode was subsequently divided into consecutive 15-sec intervals, during each of which ratings of facial expressions were performed. From these ratings several summary dimensions of affect were derived (e.g., affective peak and range during all episodes, latency and rise time for onset of distress during separation episodes, and recovery time during reunions). Term and preterm infants did not differ from one another in either the security of attachment or their affective expression and regulation. When groups were combined, patterns of affective expression were significantly different for infants classified as insecure-avoidant, insecure-ambivalent, and securely attached, as well as for group B1 + B2 infants compared to group B3 + B4 babies. The findings indicated that attachment-related affect may reflect an affect continuum that underlies certain mother- and stranger-directed behaviors in the Strange Situation, but that not all aspects of reunion behavior can be predicted by prior separation reactions.

[1]  Attachment as an Organizational Construct , 1977 .

[2]  Jacob Cohen.  A Coefficient of Agreement for Nominal Scales , 1960 .

[3]  J. Bowlby.  Attachment and loss: retrospect and prospect. , 1969, The American journal of orthopsychiatry.

[4]  S. Goldberg,et al.  Parent—Infant interaction in free play at 8 and 12 months: Effects of prematurity and immaturity* , 1980 .

[5]  T. Field.  Effects of Early Separation, Interactive Deficits, and Experimental Manipulations on Infant-Mother Face-to-Face Interaction. , 1977 .

[6]  M. Lamb,et al.  Correlations between sociability and motor performance scores in 8-month-olds , 1982 .

[7]  T. Field.  Maternal Stimulation During Infant Feeding. , 1977 .

[8]  J. Connell,et al.  Emotion and attachment: Interrelationships in a structured laboratory paradigm. , 1983 .

[9]  A. Frodi.  Fathers' and Mothers' Responses to the Faces and Cries of Normal and Premature Infants. , 1978 .

[10]  Jacob Cohen,et al.  Weighted kappa: Nominal scale agreement provision for scaled disagreement or partial credit. , 1968 .

[11]  M. Main,et al.  The quality of the toddler's relationship to mother and to father: Related to conflict behavior and the readiness to establish new relationships. , 1981 .

[12]  M. Greenberg,et al.  Social interaction and developmental competence of preterm and full-term infants during the first year of life. , 1983, Child development.

[13]  L. Sroufe.  Attachment classification from the perspective of infant-caregiver relationships and infant temperament. , 1985, Child development.

[14]  S. Goldberg.  Prematurity: Effects on Parent-Infant Interaction , 1978 .

[15]  J. Kagan.  Psychological research on the human infant : an evaluative summary , 1982 .

[16]  A. B. Hollingshead.  Four Factor Index of Social Status [1975] , 1975 .

[17]  Ross A. Thompson,et al.  Assessing Qualitative Dimensions of Emotional Responsiveness in Infants: Separation Reactions in the Strange Situation* , 1984 .

[18]  R. Bakeman,et al.  Relationships of Human Mothers with Their Infants During the First Year of Life; Effect of Prematurity , 1980 .

[19]  J. Bates,et al.  Attachment security, mother-child interaction, and temperament as predictors of behavior-problem ratings at age three years. , 1985, Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development.