Relations between attachment and child emotional and behavioral regulation were studied ... Attachment in the Strange Situation at 12 and 18 months was.
Development and Psychopathology, 13 (2001), 13–33 Copyright 2001 Cambridge University Press Printed in the United States of America
Attachment stability and emotional and behavioral regulation from infancy to preschool age
JOAN I. VONDRA, DANIEL S. SHAW, LAURE SWEARINGEN, MEREDITH COHEN, AND ELIZABETH B. OWENS University of Pittsburgh
Abstract Relations between attachment and child emotional and behavioral regulation were studied longitudinally in a sample of 223 children from urban, low-income families. Attachment in the Strange Situation at 12 and 18 months was scored using the infant classification system and at 24 months was scored using a preschool classification system. Only modest stability was found in attachment whether within or across classification systems, with the percentage of insecure attachments consistently increasing over time. Results indicated both concurrent and predictive associations with indices of child regulation based on observer ratings or maternal report. However, only the 24month classification predicted maternal report of externalizing and internalizing behavior problems at age 3.5 years, with additional variance accounted for by selected measures of child emotional and behavior regulation from the same assessment. Attachment security (B) and atypical attachment classifications (D, A/C, and AD) appear to provide the most consistently useful information about child functioning. Results are discussed in terms of continuity and change from the perspective of developmental psychopathology.
Across the 2nd year of life, children undergo a number of key developmental transitions, including the acquisition of symbolic functioning, the emergence of secondary or selfconscious emotions, new self-regulatory and coping skills, increasing locomotion and exploration of an expanded environment, and the start of the shift from sensorimotor to preoperational thinking (Bates, 1979; Campos, Caplovitz, Lamb, Goldsmith, & Stenberg, 1983; Kopp, 1982, 1992). These expanding abilities prompt higher expectations and de-
mands from caregivers, but also more overt efforts to regulate child behavior. Concomitantly, by the end of this period emotional and behavioral regulation—the management of emotional arousal and conscious control of behavior—begins what will be a very gradual shift from adult control to increasing child self-control (Cicchetti, Ganiban, & Barnett, 1991; Kopp, 1989). Differences in emotional and behavioral regulation during this period offer an early forecast of self-regulation differences—including problems in emotional and behavioral regulation—apparent in the preschool and early school years, and appear to have their roots both in early-emerging physiological differences (Gunnar, 1990; Kagan, 1994) and in the quality of interactions between child and important caregivers, perhaps best captured at present in measures of infant attachment (Cassidy, 1994; Thompson, Flood, & Lundquist, 1995). Distinctions between emotional reactivity
Funding for this investigation was provided by the National Institute of Mental Health, the Buhl Foundation, and by the Office of Child Development, Department of Psychology in Education, Department of Psychology, and Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic of the University of Pittsburgh. Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Joan I. Vondra, University of Pittsburgh, Department of Psychology in Education, 5C01 Forbes Quadrangle, Pittsburgh, PA 15260-7478.
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and emotional regulation—the experience of arousal versus efforts to manage it—and between other aspects of child temperament (e.g., sociability, activity level) and behavioral regulation or control are often obscure. Actual strategies of self-management must often be inferred. To the extent that young children’s expression of emotion and patterns of behavior are, in part, a function of both their own and their caregivers’ control, they reflect evolving regulatory processes. It goes without saying, however, that what is observed in children is also an indicator of physiologically based differences in emotional arousal, behavioral style, and even cognitive skills and style. For the purpose of this study, different indices of emotional expression and behavioral style will be grouped under the rubric of “regulation,” recognizing that observed emotion and behavior are partly products of the child’s biological disposition, his or her emerging strategies of self-monitoring and self-management, and caregiver style of support and control. Attachment and Emotional and Behavioral Regulation Conceptual arguments for links between attachment and various indices of emotional and behavioral regulation are persuasive: caregivers provide children with “emotional schemes” through modeling and interaction that become the foundation of their relationship but that also socialize children’s emotional experience and expression (Cassidy, 1994; Thompson, 1994). Securely attached children (B) are believed to experience a relationship that is responsive to and supportive of a wide range of emotional needs and signals. By having their anger, fear, and distress ameliorated by their caregiver, negative affect does not become overwhelming and disregulating but can be regulated increasingly flexibly by the children themselves. Insecurely attached children, on the other hand, are believed to experience a relationship that evolves around more selective responses to emotional needs and signals, with less tolerance in some cases for emotional distress and neediness (avoidant [A] attachments) and less
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responsiveness in other cases to distress signals unless they have been amplified or exaggerated (resistant or ambivalent [C] attachments). As a result, theoretically, insecurely attached children become less flexible in regulating their emotional experiences, with underregulation or overregulation of affect and behavior emerging over time (Sroufe, 1983). In the most extreme case, a key emotional scheme in the relationship may be the disturbing experience of frightened or frightening behavior on the part of the caregiver (disorganized [D] attachments, referred to here as “atypical”), undermining child efforts to selfregulate in a coherent and flexible manner. Correlational data on mother–child interaction and attachment support these links to emotional and behavioral regulation (see Cassidy & Berlin, 1994; Cassidy & Kobak, 1988; Lyons–Ruth, Bronfman, & Parsons, 1997). On the other hand, physiological, genetically based differences in emotional reactivity, inhibition, sociability, and attentional processes (DiLalla, Thompson, Plomin, Phillips, Fagan, Haith, Cyphers, & Fulker, 1990; Emde, Plomin, Robinson, Corley, DeFries, Fulker, Reznick, Campos, Kagan, & Zahn– Waxler, 1992; Robinson, Kagan, Reznick, & Corley, 1992; see also Calkins, 1994; Goldsmith, Bradshaw, & Rieser-Danner, 1986) play a role both in the development of emotional and behavioral regulation and in the evolution of the attachment relationship. Patterns of attachment insecurity (although not insecurity itself) have been linked to behavioral differences in the newborn period (Grossmann, Grossmann, Spangler, Suess, & Unzer, 1985; Waters, Vaughn, & Egeland, 1980) and infant emotionality across the 1st year (Belsky & Rovine, 1987; Frodi & Thompson, 1985). Differences in child temperament no doubt elicit different styles of caregiving but also shape the child’s experience of the same quality and style of care (Goldsmith & Alansky, 1987). At the same time, patterns of parental and child affect regulation probably have genetic as well as experiential linkages across generations (Plomin, 2000). From both conceptual standpoints—experiential and biological—then, one would anticipate associations between attachment and
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emotional and behavioral regulation, and associations have certainly been found (Cassidy, 1994; Fagot & Pears, 1996; Gunnar, Mangelsdorf, Larson, & Herstgaard, 1989; Lyons–Ruth, Alpern, & Repacholi, 1993; Thompson et al., 1995). However, relations are typically examined only within a single time frame, usually concurrently or predictively from a single attachment assessment. This is a limited developmental perspective, since there is no opportunity to explore changes in attachment and whether these changes are, themselves, associated with emotional and behavioral regulation. The present study considers attachment at three points in time across the transition from infancy to preschool age—12, 18, and 24 months—and its relation to child regulation in the context of both stability and change in attachment classification. Developmental Change in Attachment Crittenden (1992) argued that the transition from infancy to the preschool period involves concomitant elaboration and differentiation of internal working models of attachment. Bowlby (1969) and Ainsworth (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) clearly enumerated age-related stages in the development of child–mother attachment; the last phase, called a “goal-corrected partnership,” connotes a degree of shared responsibility in the relationship that is beyond the capabilities of an 18-month-old, whose cognitive, language, self regulatory, and motoric skills are too limited for this more sophisticated level of interpersonal negotiation. Especially relevant, developmentally based changes beginning around this time are (a) the advent of more complex language, which allows more varied attachment negotiations and richer, more direct communication about needs and (b) perspective taking, which enables children to take into account another person’s response and may encourage them to hide their true feelings or thoughts in the service of maintaining tolerable attachment relationships. One system for coding attachment in children after 20 months of age is Crittenden’s (1994) Preschool Assessment of Attach-
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ment (PAA). Crittenden (1992) described preschool attachment needs as revolving around the need to communicate rather than simply monitor, to have more control, and to be able to negotiate and plan with their caregivers. The PAA relies on the Strange Situation to elicit attachment behavior, but Crittenden’s classification criteria are in keeping with her proposal that the preschool child is more sophisticated than the infant at evolving coping strategies and that these strategies will both reflect a more complex interpretation of caregiver behavior and will include a greater diversity of attachment-related responses. Preschoolers have at their disposal a greater range of behaviors—including inhibition of and feigned affect and behavior—that can be used to achieve a particular goal; therefore, attachment coding must address and focus on the function of behaviors rather than the presence or absence of a specific behavior. The PAA utilizes one Secure (B) category and two integrated, insecure categories, Defended (A) and Coercive (C). It also includes three atypical classifications, Defended/Coercive (AC), Anxious Depressed (AD), and Disorganized (D). Children classified in the secure category are open about their needs and feelings and negotiate directly with their caregiver about separation. They also share responsibility with others for emotional regulation. The coercive strategy represents an effort to control caregiver behavior through angry, threatening, or coy (feigned immaturity or fearfulness) behavior. The defended strategy represents an effort to maintain physical proximity to the caregiver without emotional intimacy through inhibition of negative affect or false positive affect. Whereas some children classified as avoidant in infancy would expectably be coded as defended at 24 months (i.e., motoric avoidance develops into psychological avoidance, inhibition of affect), other infants with avoidant attachments might exhibit more coercive, threatening behaviors as preschoolers, precisely because their larger behavioral repertoire and increasing interactive needs result in more diverse coping strategies when their attachment needs are activated. Similarly, some securely attached infants may experiment with coy and coercive
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behavior as preschoolers and, depending on the responses of their caregiver, maintain a more coercive relationship or shift back to more flexible (i.e., secure) strategies. Crittenden’s (1992) expectation is that, during the preschool years, membership in the C category will increase to about one third, so that each (integrated) classification is about equally represented, with notably fewer instances of unintegrated strategies (AC, AD, or D) observed. The AC strategy represents an effort to cope with changing behavior on the part of the caregiver by using both coercive and defended strategies as the situation demands, whereas the AD classification involves inhibited affect, with sad or flat affect in the presence of an unresponsive caregiver and extreme distress in the absence of that caregiver. Finally, the rarely observed D classification is reserved for children who do not appear to use their behavior strategically either to elicit or respond to caregiver behavior or to soothe themselves. When children are in higher risk environments where greater independence can be, literally, dangerous (e.g., high-crime neighborhoods, unsafe housing, highly stressed parents), Crittenden (1998, personal communication) anticipates somewhat greater shifts to insecurity in the preschool years, particularly to the more extreme classifications of insecurity, whether integrated (A3, A4, C3, C4) or not (AC, AD, D). In a sample of almost 100 children from White, working- and middle-class families, Fagot and Pears (1996) found more children insecure at 30 months using the Crittenden classification system (60%) than at 18 months using the Ainsworth system (49%, ABC only), with the only increase over time in the coercive (C) classification (36% at 30 months). Overall classification stability in that sample was 66%. A comparable sample of German children, assessed at 12 and 21 months, showed similar but more extreme patterns (Rauh, Ziegenhain, Muller, & Wijnroks, in press). Sixty-two percent were scored insecure at 12 months using the Ainsworth/ Main classification systems (ABCD), whereas 83% were scored insecure at 21 months using the Crittenden system (40% were C). Overall
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stability of security/insecurity was 68%; stability of classification was presumably lower. Children at 21 months were also scored using the Ainsworth/Main criteria, resulting in a decrease in the number of insecure children from 12 (62%) to 21 (48%) months. Based on attachment stability and change, in conjunction with observations of maternal interaction at 3 and 12 months, the authors concluded that both the Ainsworth/Main and the Crittenden systems were valid (and more discriminating than the Ainsworth system [ABC] alone) at 21 months. Attachment Stability and Change Attachment theory and research suggest that both stability and change in attachment patterns over time can be lawful processes associated with relevant parent–child characteristics and behavior (Egeland & Farber, 1984; Fagot & Pears, 1996; Vondra, Shaw, & Hommerding, 1999; Wartner, Grossmann, Fremmer– Bombik, & Suess, 1995). Various studies have found that stability of attachment classification, when measured at 12 and 18 months, is positively related to socioeconomic status and negatively related to the presence of risk factors such as marital distress and dissolution, negative maternal personality attributes, and child maltreatment (Barnett, Ganiban, & Cicchetti, 1992; Egeland & Erickson, 1987; Egeland & Farber, 1984; Thompson, Lamb, & Estes, 1992; Vondra, Hommerding, & Shaw, 1992). Although much of the research supporting hypotheses about stability (and occasionally change) in attachment security has been based on samples of low-risk, middleclass, mother–child dyads, a handful of studies using low-income or high-risk populations indicate, as noted, that changes in attachment security—particularly increases in disorganized or atypical (“D,” “A/C,” “Unclassifiable”) attachments—are more characteristic of disadvantaged, high-risk, or maltreating populations than they are of low-risk, middleclass populations (Egeland & Sroufe, 1981; Lyons–Ruth, Repacholi, McLeod, & Silva, 1991; Spieker & Booth, 1985; Vaughn, Egeland, Sroufe, & Waters, 1979). In fact, more recent longitudinal data indicate only moder-
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ate stability (46–55%) in infancy in general (Belsky, Campbell, Cohn, & Moore, 1996), suggesting that the attachment measure—if not the attachment relationship—is more sensitive to changing circumstances than attachment theory has heretofore implied. Change in mother–child attachment classification clearly poses a challenge to the predictive power of early versus later assessments of attachment, although it does not preclude a meaningful role for attachment history in forecasting children’s subsequent functioning (Sroufe, Egeland, & Kreutzer, 1990). It is much rarer to find change in attachment pattern examined in relation to child emotional and behavioral regulation, due to small samples or attachment assessments at only one point in time. Egeland and Farber (1984) found that a shift from secure (B) to resistant (C) classification by 18 months was predicted by ratings of newborn emotional and behavioral irregularity and observed temperamental difficultness in feeding and play scenarios at 6 months. The opposite shift, from resistant to secure classification, was associated with higher developmental testing scores at 9 months (which tend to correlate highly with behavioral regulation during testing). The extent to which earlier attachment provides predictive power above and beyond later attachment has essentially been unexplored. However, Sroufe, Egeland, and Kreutzer (1990) offered preliminary data to support Bowlby’s (1973, 1980) contention that developmental history must contribute to adaptation above and beyond contemporaneous circumstances. The present investigation examines continuity and change in attachment across the 2nd year of life in relation to concurrent and subsequent child emotional and behavioral regulation. The population under investigation is children from urban, low-income families at varying degrees of familial risk. Based on the literature reviewed, it was expected that 1. Change in attachment would be more common in this low-income, higher stress population than in the White, middle-class population sampled in most longitudinal attachment studies, with an increasing per-
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centage of insecure attachments over time. Change would be greater across scoring systems than within scoring systems. 2. Attachment classification would show concurrent and predictive links to child emotional and behavioral regulation. 3. Patterns of attachment change from infancy (12 and 18 months) to 24 months would help differentiate children in terms of their emotional and behavioral regulation. 4. Attachment at 12 and 18 months would provide some predictive power to child regulatory problems at age 3.5 over and above attachment at 24 months. Methods Sample Two birth cohorts of children and their mothers from a longitudinal study of vulnerability and resiliency in childhood (Shaw, Owens, Vondra, Keenan, & Winslow, 1996; Vondra, Shaw, & Kevenides, 1995) provided the data for the current investigation. Two hundred twenty-three urban, low-income mothers (Cohort 1 n = 103; Cohort 2 n = 120) with infants between the ages of 5 and 11 months were recruited from Pittsburgh offices of the Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) Supplemental Nutrition Program administered by the County Health Department. Inclusion in the WIC Program requires low income (e.g., less than $22,385 for a family of four and less than $14,837 for a single mother and child in 1989, the 1st year of recruitment). Women who completed brief background questionnaires by phone or at the WIC office and took part in an initial lab visit with their infant at 12 months were included in the longitudinal investigation. At the time of the first laboratory visit at 12 months infant age, 45% of mothers reported being married or living with a partner, 13% reported being separated or divorced, and 42% reported being single. Almost three quarters of the women (74%) reported having a high school education or less, 88% reported having a family income of less than $1,500 per month, 39% were of minority race (almost
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exclusively African American), and 20% were teenagers at the time of their first child’s birth. Maternal age at the time of recruitment ranged from 16 to 39 years, with a mean of 25 years. Of the 223 infants, 54% were male, 45% were firstborn, and 13% were born more than 2 weeks prematurely. The date of the assessments at 12 and 18 months were corrected for infant gestational age. Procedures Mothers were asked to bring their child to the university for observations and assessments at the child ages of 12, 18, and 24 months, and to schedule a home visit when their child was either 15 (Cohort 1) or 18 (Cohort 2) months old. Follow-up contact with mothers was completed by telephone and by mail when children were between 3 and 4 years old. Of the 223 infants observed at 12 months, 165 were rated by their mothers at approximately 3.5 years of age on a behavior problem checklist. Indices of emotional and behavioral regulation collected between 12 and 24 months were used to compare those infants with and without follow-up data. Of 17 measures collected during infancy, only two showed differences, neither of which reached formal statistical significance. Children without follow-up ratings scored somewhat lower on activity/excitability during developmental testing in the home between 15 and 18 months, t (199) = 1.80, p < .10, but were rated as somewhat more fussy/difficult by their mothers at the 18-month lab visit, t (150) = −1.95, p < .10. Lab assessments began with a free-play period for the child (when mothers completed questionnaires nearby with the examiner), followed by a series of interactive activities (examiner absent from the room), a rest/snack period in another room, and the Strange Situation. Mothers completed questionnaires with the examiner after the Strange Situation, while a babysitter entertained the child. The order of the Strange Situation and free-play period was counterbalanced at 12 months only (all Cohort 1 children had the Strange Situation last, all Cohort 2 children had the Strange Situation first; no differences in the
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distribution of attachment classifications were found across cohorts). Each lab visit took approximately 2 hours to complete and was videotaped from a fixed camera on the wall or through a one-way mirror to facilitate behavioral coding. Home visits began with a free-play period and developmental assessment of the child. Following this, mothers completed an interview and questionnaires while a babysitter entertained the child. Observations of mother– child interaction throughout the visit were made. Examiners varied from visit to visit, although on occasion the same examiner conducted more than one visit for a given family. Across all pairs of lab and home visits, 87% (range 78–100%) were conducted by different examiners. Measures Attachment. Attachment security was assessed using the Strange Situation paradigm (Ainsworth & Wittig, 1969). At 12 and 18 months, attachment classification (A, Avoidant; B, Secure; C, Resistant; D, Disorganized) was coded using the Ainsworth (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) and Main (Main & Solomon, 1990) criteria. The first author was trained to 100% reliability with A. Sroufe (5 cases), 85% reliability with M. Ward and B. Vaughn (20 cases), and 75% with D. Cicchetti (16 cases). Six graduate student raters, blind to other ratings of the mother and child, were trained to reliability by the first author and tested for interrater agreement using two different sets of attachment assessments, one set from the lab of J. Belsky and a second set from the lab of A. Sroufe. Interrater agreement on major classifications ranged from 80 to 100% with a mean of 83% for the test (nonstudy) assessments, and averaged 77% (20 cases) with the first author for a random set of study tapes. Tapes were scored by the first author or by at least two of the trained raters. In cases of disagreement, a third rater was used. At 24 months, attachment classification (A, Defended; B, Secure; C, Coercive; A/C or AD, Atypical) was coded using the PAA
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(Crittenden, 1994). Four graduate student raters were trained by P. Crittenden to 85% reliability using her system. Two of these raters had rated a subset of the 12 or 18 month tapes. To help ensure independence of ratings, 24-month attachment was always scored either by two independent raters or by a single rater blind to infant attachment classifications. Average interrater agreement on major classifications was 62% (27 cases) for a random set of cases from the study. In cases of disagreement, a third rater was used. Thirty (15%) of the 24-month attachments were scored by P. Crittenden. Child emotional and behavioral regulation. During each lab visit (12, 18, and 24 months), children were observed with their mothers during a series of four teaching tasks. Activities were selected that were too difficult for children of that age to complete independently, and thus required maternal assistance (e.g., stack a set of plastic rings on a pole at 12 months, work a lock–key toy at 18 months, complete a puzzle at 24 months). In each case, mothers were instructed to work on the task for 3 min and then, at a knock, to put away the current task and start the next one. Ratings of child positive and negative affect and task-oriented (attentive, effortful) behavior were completed by two trained raters at 12 and 24 months (blind to attachment classifications), using simple three-point scales (0, none; 1, low; 2, high). Percent exact agreement was 75% for positive affect, 86% for negative affect, and 84% for task orientation using a random set of 32 cases from the study. Because emotional and behavioral regulation in toddlerhood is still a joint function of child and caregiver, child affect and persistence can be viewed as a reflection of how effectively the dyadic system is regulating the child. Global ratings of child emotional and behavior regulation were made from observations of the entire 24-month lab visit using the Early Coping Inventory (ECI; Zeitlin, Williamson, & Szczepanski, 1988). Designed for use with young children between the ages of 4 and 36 months, the inventory assesses the age- and situation-appropriate effectiveness of a wide range of behaviors considered impor-
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tant to early coping efforts. The ECI consists of 48 items reflecting temperament, sensory processing, motor control, and socioemotional factors. Scores on the ECI differentiate young children with mental or physical disabilities from nondisabled peers (Williamson, Zeitlin, & Szczepanski, 1989; Zeitlin & Williamson, 1990). A single trained rater, blind to attachment classification and other emotional and behavioral regulation ratings, completed 36 of the 48 five-point behavior ratings on the basis of behavior throughout the 24-month visit (excluded items concerned sensory and motor handicaps not seen in the sample). Ratings were factor analyzed to create internally consistent global ratings of regulation.A fourfactor solution emerged, accounting for 52% of the variance in scores. The first factor, termed “assertive,” consisted of eight items and loaded heaviest on items “Child expresses likes and dislikes,” “Child expresses a range of feelings,” and “Child has an energy level that is forceful and vigorous.” The second factor, termed “adaptable,” consisted of nine items and loaded heaviest on items “Child adapts to changes in environment,” “Child accepts substitute people or objects when necessary,” “Child finds a way of handling a new or difficult situation,” and “Child demonstrates ability to self comfort.” The third factor, termed “sociable,” consisted of seven items and loaded heaviest on items “Child gives warmth and affection to others,” “Child accepts warmth and support from familiar persons,” and “Child maintains visual attention to people and objects.” The fourth and final factor, termed “competent exploration,” consisted of seven items and loaded heaviest on items “Child initiates exploration of own body or objects using a variety of strategies,” “Child demonstrates persistence during activities,” and “Child completes self-initiated activity.” On a random subset of 12 cases, agreement within 5 points on the summed scales ranged from 83% to 100%, with correlations ranging from .78 to .92. During the home visit, trained examiners administered the Bayley Scales of Infant Development and its accompanying Infant Behavior Record (IBR; Bayley, 1969). The IBR consists of a series of 5- and 9-point rating
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scales (13 in all) evaluating social and object orientation during standardized developmental testing. Scale scores were entered into a factor analysis to create internally consistent global ratings of emotional and behavioral regulation. A three-factor solution emerged, accounting for 99% of the variance. The first factor, termed “mastery motivated,” consisted of five items and loaded heaviest on items “Persistence in goal-directed effort” and “Tendency to persist in attending to any one object, person, or activity.” The second factor, termed “active/reactive,” consisted of three items and loaded heaviest on items “Amount of gross bodily movement” and “The ease with which a child is stimulated to react in general, excitability.” The third and final factor, termed “comfortable,” consisted of four items and loaded heaviest on items “Tenseness of body” and “Degree of happiness.” Interrater reliability was assessed using a small number (N = 8) of pilot subjects at the end of training, prior to data collection. Agreement on scores based on these three factors varied tremendously, with good to excellent reliability on the mastery motivation (intraclass correlation: .72) and comfort (intraclass correlation: .92) scores, but no reliability on the activity/reactivity score (intraclass correlation: −.06), due to extremely restricted variability across pilot children on this factor. Examiners making IBR ratings during the home visit were blind to attachment classifications and the other behavioral ratings described above. Maternal ratings. At each lab visit, mothers completed the Difficultness scale of the Infant Characteristics Questionnaire (ICQ; Bates, Freeland, & Lounsbury, 1979). This scale had the strongest psychometric characteristics in the validation study of the ICQ, with moderate correlations between both maternal and paternal report and observer ratings on the same measure. Slightly different versions are available for 13- (nine items) and 24-month (seven items) infants (used at the 12- and 24month lab visits, respectively). At the 18month visit, items from both versions were used. Scores from the measure have been shown to predict behavior problems at pre-
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school age (Bates, Maslin, & Frankel, 1985), and its selection reflected our interest in the early expression and regulation of negative affect as an early indicator of developmental vulnerability. As part of the 3.5-year follow-up contact, mothers completed the Child Behavior Checklist for Ages 2 to 3 (Achenbach, 1992) by mail. This 100-item questionnaire generates two broadband factors, externalizing (problems with underregulating affect and behavior) and internalizing behavior problems (problems with overregulating affect and behavior), for both boys and girls. Test–retest reliability is reported to be .87 by the author. Results Relations among indices of infant regulation As a preliminary step, patterns of association were examined among the 16 indices of emotional and behavioral regulation that were collected in infancy. Within a particular task or activity, correlations were generally moderate (but highly significant), ranging from an average of .21 (ratings during 12-month teaching tasks) to .55 (maternal ratings of difficultness at 12, 18, and 24 months). Correlations across activities (and time) were notably less consistent but present in piecemeal fashion. Factor analysis of the 16 scores indicated a three-factor solution, which accounted for 88% of the variance. Factor 1 consisted of all observational ratings at 24 months (on the ECI and during the teaching tasks, rated by independent observers). Factor 2 incorporated the three maternal ratings of difficultness (at 12, 18, and 24 months), and Factor 3 represented examiner ratings of behavior during developmental testing (at 15 or 18 months). The 12month teaching task ratings did not load on any of these factors and also had the lowest intercorrelations. Individual scores with the most frequent correlations across measures were the “mastery motivation” (IBR) score during developmental testing (the only observer rating associated—negatively—with maternal ratings of difficultness) and the four “coping” scores from the ECI. Given that regulation indices were collected during different
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Table 1. Distribution of attachment patterns across the 2nd year of life
Sample size B A1, A2 A3, A4 C1, C2 C3, C4 D or A/C Depressed affect/AD
12 Months (Ainsworth Coding)
18 Months (Ainsworth Coding)
24 Months (Crittenden Coding)
223 52% (117) 18% (40) — 16% (35) — 13% (28) 1% (3)
198 47% (93) 24% (47) — 9% (18) — 15% (29) 5% (11)
201 26% (52) 20% (41) 13% (26) 33% (67) 4% (8) 2% (3) 2% (4)
activities at different ages, these general results are not surprising. Classification distributions The distribution of attachment classifications at each age appears in Table 1. As predicted, the percentage of secure (B) attachments consistently declined and the percentage of insecure attachments increased both across time (12, 18, 24 months) and classification system (Ainsworth to Crittenden). Within the insecure category, the percentage of A attachments consistently increased; the percentage of children with C or atypical attachments tended to be low at each age, and no consistent patterns were discernible. The change to a different classification system at 24 months, however, was accompanied by an increase in the percentage of C attachments and a decrease in the percentage of atypical attachments. Attachment stability data appear in Tables 2 and 3. It should be noted that criteria for stability changed between infancy (12 to 18 months), when exact classification match was used, and preschool age (12/18 to 24 months), when at least one classification match was used (a match between either 12 and 24 months or 18 and 24 months). Thus, the criterion for a match across classification systems was more liberal than that within the infant classification system. Perfect matches across all three ages were quite rare: 20 BBB (10% of the sample), 7 AAA (4%), 3 CCC (1.5%) and 1 DD-Atypical (
