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The Influence Of A Mother’S Attachment Representation On The Quality Of Her Interactions With Each Of Her Children, Vanessa Villani, Greg Moran

Psychology Presentations

This study evaluated whether certain maternal states of mind, as assessed by the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), would lead to more similarities/differences in maternal behaviors across multiple infants, as defined by the domains of the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort. Results indicated that “unresolved” maternal states of mind incline mothers to behave more similarly with their two infants than mothers with non-autonomous or autonomous states of mind in terms of responsiveness and affect sharing behaviors.

Psychometric Properties Of A Short Version Of The Maternal Behavior Q-Sort: What You Need To Know Before Analyzing The Data, Heidi N. Bailey, Rossana Bisceglia, Jacqueline Roche, Jennifer Jenkins, Greg Moran

Psychology Presentations

OVERVIEW • N =116 mother-infant dyads (2 months old) • Coders completed the MBQS-mini 2 ways—forced vs. unforced q-sort distributions—to determine whether psychometric properties differed.

SENSITIVITY SCORES: • were virtually identical:r= .99.

BEHAVIORAL DOMAINS: • Attachment related domains: esponsiveness, Non-Interference, Affective Communication. • For all 3 (but not the Teaching domain) forced and unforced were highly correlated, and high internal consistency.

CONCLUSIONS: • Results support the use of forced q-sort data, but show no benefits associated with using forced over unforced distributions. Internal consistency was higher for the unforced teaching domain.

Antecedents Of Attachment Disorganization Across The First Year: Interactions Among Child And Parent Variables, Lindsey M. Forbes, Greg Moran, David R. Pederson

Psychology Presentations

Disorganized attachmentis seen as reflecting an infant’s lack of strategyfor coping with the stress of the Strange Situation procedure (SSP; Ainsworth et al., 1978)

The identification of disorganized attachment by Main and Solomon (1986) generated a large body of research into its antecedents and consequences.

Despite these advances, however, 1)few studies have employed a prospective longitudinal designto clarify antecedents of disorganization, and 2)most research has focused on predicting disorganization from single risk factors, rarely investigating possible interactions among child and parent or environmental variables.

The current study investigated the development of disorganized attachment across the first year from a prospective …

Associations Between Caregivers' Global And Specific Attachment Representations And The Infant-Caregiver Attachment Relationship, Erinn Hawkins, Sheri Madigan, Diane Benoit, Greg Moran

Psychology Presentations

The primary objectives of the current study were: (1)to determine the extent to which caregivers’ conceptualizations of their own attachment history (global attachment representations are congruent with the way in which they conceptualize their relationships with a specific child (relationship-specific attachment representations); and (2)to evaluate whether these relationship-specific representations play a mediating role in the intergenerational transmission of attachment. Prenatal assessments of caregivers’ global attachment representations, as measured by the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI), and relationship-specific attachment representations, as measured by the Working Model of the Child Interview (WMCI), were obtained in a sample of 196 mother-infant dyads. Infant-caregiver attachment …

Maternal Sensitivity: From Child To The Neighborhood, Rossana Bisceglia, Heidi N. Bailey, Jennifer Jenkins, Greg Moran

Psychology Presentations

The purpose of this study was to explore the possible association between maternal sensitivity and distal factors such as neighborhood quality.

480 mother-child dyads were videotaped during a naturalistic interaction. Maternal sensitivity was assessed from video-tapes using the Maternal Behavior Q-sort (MBQS; Pederson & Moran, 1995).

Results of a hierarchical regression showed that maternal sensitivity was associated with: child characteristics (e.g. infant weight), maternal characteristics (e.g. age and depression) and family attributes (e.g. household income).

Interviewers’ ratings of neighborhood challenge and mothers’ report of neighborhood quality were found to significantly relate to maternal sensitivity and explained additional variance.

Results indicate …

Sibling Mother-Infant Attachment: Different Patterns Of Interaction Lead To Similar Relationships, Kathleen O’Connor, Ya Xue, Tara Morley, Greg Moran, David R. Pederson, Sandi Bento, Heidi N. Bailey

Psychology Presentations

PURPOSE: To investigate the role of maternal sensitivity and interactive behavior in sibling attachment non-/concordance. RESULTS:1) Global measures of sensitivity suggest that mothers of concordant-secure and non-concordant infants demonstrate a similar degree of sensitivity towards each child. 2) Mothers with non-concordant infants interact more similarly with each child on domains of maternal sensitivity, compared to mothers whose infants are concordant.

CONCLUSION: The quality of the attachment relationship in families with non-concordant mother-infant relationships –in contrast to families with concordant dyads –does not appear to be systematically affected by maternal sensitivity as typically assessed. More detailed assessment of the interactions suggest …

Grasping And Lifting Different Materials, Gavin Buckingham, Jonathan S. Cant, Melvyn A. Goodale

Psychology Presentations

The material from which an object is made can determine how heavy it feels (Seashore, 1899). Interestingly, a metal block that has been adjusted to have the same size and mass as a polystyrene block will feel lighter than the polystyrene block. We recently showed that participants experiencing this material-weight illusion’ (MWI) do not apply forces that match their perceptual experience of heaviness ‐ just like in the size‐weight illusion ( Flanagan & Beltzner, 2000).

Our previous study showed that forces on early trials were scaled to each participant’s expectations of how much a particular block should weigh ‐ excessive …

A Dissociation Between Perception And Action In The Material‐Weight Illusion, Gavin Buckingham, Jonathan S. Cant, Kai-Ling C. Kao, Melvyn A. Goodale

Psychology Presentations

We examined what forces are applied to objects that elicit this illusion when they are lifted.We predicted that:

(1) Forces on early trials will scale to each participant’s expectations of how much a particular block will weigh ‐ excessive force will be applied to the metal block and insufficient force applied to the polystyrene block.

(2) Forces on later trials will scale to the real weight of each block ‐ identical levels of force applied to all the blocks.

(3) MWI will persist throughout ‐ polystyrene block will feel the heaviest, metal block will feel the lightest.