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Influences of attachment theory on emotional development
Theory of attachment development
Essay on attachment style
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As developmental psychologists, we are taught about attachment styles at a very early stage in our education. By the time we become educated on the different attachment styles, we are often too quick to move on to the next subject of study rather than internalize what we have learned. The attachment styles we develop as children are crucial to many aspects of our life and development and can tell us many things about ourselves through adolescence and adulthood. Attachment in peer relationships, romantic relationships, and family structure can help or hinder portions of our identity development. Attachment can also explain or predict certain behaviors we may see as we age, and any impact those behaviors have on our identity development in adolescence. It is my aim to explain the types of attachment seen in both children and adults and illustrate how they relate to the formation of identity throughout the lifespan. I will then use what I have learned introspectively and relate my findings on attachment styles and identity development to my personal life story for analysis. In 1970, developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth designed a study in the hopes of classifying varying types of attachments seen in children (Ainsworth & Bell, 1970). The study consisted of a parent and 12-18 month old child entering a strange but appealing room filled with toys. On multiple occasions, the mother would leave and a stranger would enter and try to console the child, who was upset with the departure of the mother. The mother would then return, and the behavior of the child would be recorded. Researchers labeled the behavior patterns of children in the study as “strange situation classifications”, and focused on four behaviors – separation anxiety... ... middle of paper ... ...hese youth display concerns of being abandoned, being taken advantage of, or of failing to meet their needs for a great sense of security, likely due to their experiences with higher levels of anxiety. Relationships characterized by emotional over-involvement leads to the persons identity being defined mainly in terms of the relationship itself” (Avila, Cabral, & Matos, 2002). This really hit home for me. I put way too much of myself into all of my relationships, and when they dissolve, I lose my identity completely. I think I have improved tremendously since high school, but I still need to be careful with myself. This showed me exactly what not to do; which is unfortunately exactly what I’ve been doing. My anxious attachment affects everything I do and all the relationships I have. Based on my findings, most everyone with anxious attachments feels the same way.
From birth to about six months old, an infant doesnÂ’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.
Spiegel, D., Loewenstein, R. J., Lewis-Fernández, R., Sar, V., Simeon, D., Vermetten, E., & ... Dell, P. F. (2011). Dissociative disorders in DSM-5. Depression & Anxiety (1091-4269), 28(9), 824-852. doi:10.1002/da.20874
The first topic that came up in the interview relates to idea of attachment theory. Attachment theory explains the human’s way of relating to a caregiver and receives an attachment figures relating to the parent, and children. In addition, the concept explains the confidence and ability for a child to free explore their environment with a place to seek support, protection, and comfort in times of distress (Levy, Ellison, Scott, and Bernecker, 2010, p. 193). Within attachment theory explains different types of attachment styles that children experience during early childhood. These attachment styles affect the relationships they continue to build in adulthood. The best attachment style happens when the parent is attuned to the child during his or her early childhood called secure attachment (Reyes, 2010, p. 174). In order for complete secure attachment, the child needs to feel safe, seen, and soothed. Any relationship that deviates from this model represents the anxious or insecure attachment. This means that parents or caregivers are inconsistently responsive to the children. Children who have these parents are usually confused and insecure. Some children experience a dismissive attachment where they
Admittedly, many psychologists define attachment as an enduring, affectionate bond that one person forms between himself and another person throughout life. Mary Ainsworth provided the most famous research: strange situation, offering explanations of individual differences in attachment. However, in this Adult Attachment Style questionnaire that I took, I found many factors relevant to attachment as defined in the textbook. For example, in the textbook, it defines attachment based on Ainsworth research, the strange situation by observing attachment forms between mother and infants. They are described in four attachment styles: securely attached, insecure avoidant, insecure resistant, and insecure disorganized.
People often think that D.I.D. (Dissociative Identity Disorder) is something made up, something that a person is just inventing in order to get attention; that statement couldn’t be more Incorrect. Dissociative Identity Disorder, formally known at Multiple Personality Disorder, is a dissociative disorder, not a personality disorder or a psychosis. D.I.D. is a severe form of dissociation, a mental process which produces a lack of connection in a person’s thoughts, memories, emotion, behavior, or sense of identity. D.I.D. is thought to stem from trauma experienced by the person with the disorder. The dissociative aspect is thought to be a coping mechanism; the person literally dissociates himself or herself from a situation or experience that is too violent, traumatic, or painful to assimilate with his or her conscious self.
John Bowlby’s attachment theory established that an infant’s earliest relationship with their primary caregiver or mother shaped their later development and characterized their human life, “from the cradle to the grave” (Bowlby, 1979, p. 129). The attachment style that an infant develops with their parent later reflects on their self-esteem, well-being and the romantic relationships that they form. Bowlby’s attachment theory had extensive research done by Mary Ainsworth, who studied the mother-infant interactions specifically regarding the theme of an infant’s exploration of their surrounding and the separation from their mother in an experiment called the strange situation. Ainsworth defined the four attachment styles: secure, insecure/resistant, insecure/avoidant and disorganized/disoriented, later leading to research studies done to observe this behavior and how it affects a child in their adolescence and adulthood.
Attachment is described as the close emotional bond between two people and Attachment Theory (AT) generally concentrates on the early bonds in a person’s development as well as the effects that these bonds have on later socio-emotional development. While emphasis on attachment as an antecedent for future behavior and personality has decreased somewhat in recent years, it is interesting to note that the DSM IV-TR includes a “reactive attachment disorder” which it states is caused when extreme circumstances prevent proper attachment development.
Pais, S. (2009). A Systemic Approach to the Treatment of Dissociative Identity Disorder. Journal Of Family Psychotherapy, 20(1), 72-88. doi:10.1080/08975350802716566
Mental disorders have baffled physicians, psychiatrists and the general public since the beginning of time. One particular disorder called Dissociative Identity Disorder, also known as Multiple Personality Disorder, has caused controversy between those who believe it is real and those who think it is purely part of an individual’s imagination. For those who believe strongly in its existence, it poses very real consequences and hardships. Dissociative Identity Disorder has many causes, symptoms, and treatments; unfortunately, those who don’t take it seriously use it as a scapegoat for others undiagnosed problems.
Dissociative Identity Disorder, or DID, is defined as: “The result of a marvelously creative defense mechanism that a young child uses to cope with extremely overwhelming trauma” (Hawkins, 2003, p. 3). Ross describes DID in this way: “In its childhood onset forms, the disorder is an effective strategy for coping with a traumatic environment: It becomes dysfunctional because environmental circumstances have changed by adulthood” (1997, p, 62). What types of traumatic environments are we talking about here? Often children who form DID are involved in some sort of abuse. These types of abuses can be physical, sexual and even ritual. Such abuses are not meant for children to have to endure, however, the mind is able to deal in effective ways to allow the child to bear such intolerable environments. As one examines this subject, one finds that there are varied opinions on DID, however, it is important to understand the nature of DID, types of DID as well as DID symptoms and healing in adults.
Living a normal life seems to be everyone’s ultimate lifestyle, but there are some people that cannot control what happens in their lives because it can be a social, behavioral, or environmental effect that can troublesome their daily tasks of life. There are so many disorders that can cause issues for an individual’s well-being, and one disorder is the dissociative identity disorder (DID). According to Zimbarodo (2009), “Dissociative identity disorder is a complicated, long-lasting posttraumatic disorder, which was previously called multiple personality disorder” (p. 550). In some cultures, DID is explain by the presence of demon or spirit possessions, but in the Western society, this disorder has been vindicated to seek serious attention and is now included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition (Kluft, 2005, p. 635).
My topic of choice for this research paper is Dissociative Identity Disorder or DID. This appellation is rather new; therefore, most are more familiar with the disorder's older, less technical name: Multiple Personality Disorder or MPD. When first presented with the task of selecting a topic on which to center this paper, I immediately dismissed Dissociative Identity Disorder (which for the sake of brevity will be referred to as DID for the remainder of this paper) as a viable topic due to the sheer scope of the disorder. However after an exhaustive examination of other prospective topics, I found myself back at my original choice. There are several reasons why I chose DID. The foremost of which is the widespread fascination of this disorder by many different types of people; most of whom otherwise have no interest in psychology or its associated fields. One would be hard pressed to find someone who hasn’t been captivated at one time or another by the extraordinary, all too well known symptoms of this disorder. This fascination… dare I say ‘allure’ to this disorder is exemplified by the myriad of motion pictures that have been produced based on cases, real or fictitious, of DID. Another reason for my choice is what I feel is the insufficiency of effective treatments for DID. Despite what is known about this disorder, (which is relatively a lot) there are only two chief treatments for DID; the first and most prevalent is psychotherapy; also known as ”talk therapy”, the second is medication. The third and final reason for my choice is my own enchantment with DID. I must admit that ever since I read about Sue Tinker, a woman who was diagnosed with over 200 different personalities. In writing this paper I hope to discover more about this disorder and perhaps be able to identify a few areas that I feel might require more research on the part of psychologists specializing in DID.
Further research on Dissociative Identity Disorder led to a separate section for dissociative disorders in the DSM-III, which was published in 1980. In the DSM-III, Dissociative Idendity Disorder was renamed to Multiple Personality Disorder. This version of the DSM was the first version in which this disorder was recognized as a separate diagnosis instead of being recognized as one of a number of dissociative symptoms that were grouped together under one diagnosis (History of Dissociative Identity Disorder). The separation of diagnoses gave legitimacy to dissociation as a condition/disorder (A History). Bliss, Coons, Greaves, Rosenbaum, and many other researchers published landmark articles containing their research on dissociation. These publications initiated a huge increase in the diagnosis of Dissociative Identity Disorder. The increase of diagnoses generated controversy and skepticism. Some professionals that were extremely skeptical of the diagnosis were found to be falsifying clinical data, and deliberately interfering with the clinical care of patients (History of Dissociative Identity Disorder). Skepticism resulted in the recognition that patients with this disorder are often misdiagnosed as suffering from schizophrenia. Today, patients with Dissociative Identity Disorder are still commonly misdiagnosed with Schizophrenia (History of Dissociative Identity Disorder).
What I find riveting about this research is how people cope with this disorder, and what does it take for them to heal and live a productive life. It is also interesting that severe psychological disorders (DD, in particular) did not have much treatment or research supporting it. “The goal of this naturalistic observational 30-month follow-up study of an international sample of patients with dissociative disorders was to determine if treatment provided by community providers was associated with improvements in symptoms and adaptive functioning" (1). This method involves observing participants in their natural environment. This kind of research is often utilized in situations were conducting laboratory research is cost prohibitive, impractical, or would immensely impact the participant's behavior. The reason why this research is necessary is because there has not been a lot of research on what treatment is most effective for this disorder. The existing examination relied on a practice session network methodological psychoanalysis in which residential therapists, and their patients are recruited as the participants in
Approval was necessary before the study began by an institutional review board, this was obtained before hand and made sure that everything was run ethically. Personal interviews were held anywhere from 30 minutes to a full hour and was recorded to later be transcribed verbatim by one of the research team members. Unfortunately, because the disorder is so difficult to diagnose amongst the general public, but makes up about 29% of the clinical population, the interviews had to be conducted over the phone because everyone lived far away from one another. In order to give voice to the lived experiences of the men living with D.I.D, they utilized a qualitative methodology from a phenomenological paradigm. Because DID is still a highly debated disorder amongst psychologists everywhere, about its existence, a phenomenological approach allows for the assumption that there is no fixed reality but rather reality is viewed through a social constructivist lens in which individuals make meaning of their own lives. With that being said, each participant was a asked a series of open ended questions meant to evoke themes about their individual experiences. Along with these open ended questions, they were given a demographic questionnaire and the Dissociative Experiences Scale–II sent via e-mail. The DES-II consists of 28 items that require participants to self-report experiences on how