Parent-Child Attachment Relationship

Research has repeatedly shown that the parent-child attachment relationship has a significantly profound effect on the development of a child. Some believe that attachment is the single most important relationship that a young infant/toddler will engage in so early in their life. This relationship sets the framework for almost all degrees of development that a child goes through. The quality of attachment will determine one’s long term outcomes in so many areas. A major component in determining the quality and degree of attachment is the pathology of the mother. In 1990, Gelfand & Teti described a mother’s depressed mood as being “less responsive, more helpless, hostile, critical, alternatively disregarded or intrusive, disorganized and less
al in 1995. Their focus was on attachment relationships between infant and preschool aged children and their depressed mothers. The authors looked at the attachment relationship in regards to the severity of the depression. There were two groups that were observed in this study. The first were depressed mothers in therapy at time of recruitment and the second were community matched non-depressed mothers, which was the control group. The authors were determined to answer three hypotheses. They predicted that maternal depression would relate with the child’s sense of security, with a significantly higher percentage of insecure children having depressed mothers. Secondly, chronic and severe maternal impairment would be associated with disorganized attachment in infancy. Finally, more chronic and severe maternal depression would be linked to anxious depressed and insecure preschoolers. One hundred and four families (61 depressed mothers, 43 nondepressed) were evaluated for this study. 95% of the participants were white, 44% Hispanic, and 1% African American. The mother’s age ranged from 18.5-45.4 years of age and the children ranged in age from 3-13 months. In this sample, the depressed mothers were seen to have lower educational levels, lower yearly income, and more likely to be a single
Rosenblum et al divided depression into two groups: dull/slow and stressed/irritable. The authors describe dull and slow depression as a “loss in interest, psychomotor abatement, excess of sleep, and an affective dulling.” Stressed and irritable depression is seen as “irritable, feelings of guilt, stressed insomniac, may suffer from anorexia.” The relationship between the mother and the child were evaluated when the child was one year of age. The type of maternal depression and the quality of attachment were looked at. The hypothesis was that infants of depressed mothers would show poor emotional expressions. The infant’s affective responses and emotions would be determined by the type of depression the mother was incapacitated with. Finally, infants with depressed mothers were expected to have an insecure attachment relationship with their mother and those infants with non-depressed mothers would show more secure attachment relationships. Fifty four mothers (29 depressed, 25 non-depressed) with thirteen showing signs of dull/slow depression and 16 in the stressed/irritable group. The mothers were evaluated at three six months after the birth of their child. The children were seen at 12, 18, 24, and 36 months old. Interactions between the mother and child were