Are infant attachment patterns continuously or categorically distributed? A taxometric analysis of strange situation behavior.

Contemporary attachment research is based on the assumption that at least three types of infant attachment patterns exist: secure, avoidant, and resistant. It is not known, however, whether individual differences in attachment organization are more consistent with a continuous or a categorical model. The authors addressed this issue by applying P. E. Meehl's (1973, 1992) taxometric techniques for distinguishing latent types (i.e., classes, natural kinds) from latent continua (i.e., dimensions) to Strange Situation data on 1,139 fifteen-month-old children from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care. The results indicate that variation in attachment patterns is largely continuous, not categorical. The discussion focuses on the implications of dimensional models of individual differences for attachment theory and research.

[1]  D. Cicchetti,et al.  Attachment in the preschool years , 1991 .

[2]  W. E. Blatz.  Human Security: Some Reflections , 1966 .

[3]  Jude Cassidy,et al.  Security in infancy, childhood, and adulthood: A move to the level of representation. , 1985 .

[4]  M. Ainsworth.  Infancy In Uganda, Infant Care and the Growth of Love , 1967 .

[5]  R. Chris Fraley,et al.  Adult Romantic Attachment: Theoretical Developments, Emerging Controversies, and Unanswered Questions , 2000 .

[6]  P. Lachenbruch.  Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences (2nd ed.) , 1989 .

[7]  Phillip R. Shaver,et al.  Handbook of attachment : theory, research, and clinical applications , 1999 .

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

[9]  M. Ainsworth,et al.  Attachment, exploration, and separation: illustrated by the behavior of one-year-olds in a strange situation. , 1970, Child development.

[10]  Bonnie Knoke,et al.  The Effects of Infant Child Care on Infant-Mother Attachment Security: Results of the NICHD Study of Early Child Care NICHD Early Child Care Research Network. , 1997, Child development.

[11]  Jacob Cohen.  The Cost of Dichotomization , 1983 .

[12]  R. Chris Fraley,et al.  Attachment Stability From Infancy to Adulthood: Meta-Analysis and Dynamic Modeling of Developmental Mechanisms , 2002 .

[13]  Kelly A. Brennan,et al.  Self-report measurement of adult attachment: An integrative overview. , 1998 .

[14]  N. Waller,et al.  Types of dissociation and dissociative types: A taxometric analysis of dissociative experiences , 1996 .

[15]  P. Meehl.  Bootstraps taxometrics. Solving the classification problem in psychopathology. , 1995, The American psychologist.

[16]  E. Waters,et al.  Defining and Assessing Individual Differences in Attachment Relationships: Q-Methodology and the Organization of Behavior in Infancy and Early Childhood. , 1985 .

[17]  M. Ainsworth,et al.  Origins of the Sense of Security. (Book Reviews: Patterns of Attachment. A Psychological Study of the Strange Situation) , 1978 .

[18]  Niels G. Waller,et al.  Adult attachment patterns: A test of the typological model. , 1998 .

[19]  Jacob Cohen.  Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences , 1969, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design.

[20]  Mark Snyder,et al.  "To Carve Nature at Its Joints": On the Existence of Discrete Classes in Personality , 1985 .

[21]  Paul E. Meehl,et al.  Multivariate Taxometric Procedures: Distinguishing Types from Continua , 1997 .

[22]  E. Waters,et al.  The stability of attachment security from infancy to adolescence and early adulthood: general discussion. , 2000, Child development.

[23]  Paul E. Green,et al.  Mathematical Tools for Applied Multivariate Analysis , 1976 .

[24]  N. Haslam.  Evidence that male sexual orientation is a matter of degree. , 1997, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[25]  N. Haslam,et al.  Robustness of Taxometric Analysis with Skewed Indicators: I. a Monte Carlo Study of the Mambac Procedure , 1996, Psychological reports.

[26]  M. Main,et al.  Procedures for identifying infants as disorganized/disoriented during the Ainsworth Strange Situation. , 1990 .

[27]  E. M. Cummings.  Classification of attachment on a continuum of felt security: Illustrations from the study of children of depressed parents. , 1990 .

[28]  P. Meehl,et al.  Taxometric Analysis: II. Detecting Taxonicity Using Covariance of Two Quantitative Indicators in Successive Intervals of a Third Indicator (Maxcov Procedure) , 1996 .

[29]  T. Trull,et al.  Categorical versus dimensional status of borderline personality disorder. , 1990, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[30]  J. Langlois,et al.  Infant day-care, attachment, and the "file drawer problem". , 1994, Child development.

[31]  D. Cicchetti,et al.  Attachment in the preschool years: Theory, research, and intervention. , 1990 .

[32]  Attachment as an Organizational Construct , 1977 .

[33]  J. Simpson,et al.  Attachment theory and close relationships. , 1998 .

[34]  E. Waters,et al.  Empirical classification of infant-mother relationships from interactive behavior and crying during reunion. , 1988, Child development.

[35]  P. Meehl.  Psychodiagnosis: Selected Papers , 1973 .

[36]  P. Meehl.  Factors and Taxa, Traits and Types, Differences of Degree and Differences in Kind , 1992 .