They are related to the extent to which the parent is sensitive to the child's signal ... caregiver as unresponsive and unloving and of themselves as unworthy of ...
UNIVERSITÉ DU QUÉBEC À MONTRÉAL
PATRONS DE COMMUNICATION NON-VERBALE ET RELATION D’ATTACHEMENT PARENT-ENFANT
THÈSE DE DOCTORAT PRÉSENTÉE COMME EXIGENCE PARTIELLE DU DOCTORAT EN PSYCHOLOGIE
PAR JÚLIA SCARANO DE MENDONÇA
SEPTEMBRE 2005
1
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1 Taxonomy of nonverbal communication
30
Table 2 Grading scores for each nonverbal communication category
36
Table 3 Means, standard deviations, and ANOVAs’ results for each communication category
46
Table 4 Reliability scores of the attachment scales for the mother’s and the father’s responses (Cronbach Alphas) 50 Table 5 Correlation coefficients between the attachment scales derived from the mothers’ Q.sort 51 Table 6 Correlation coefficients between the attachment scales derived from the fathers’ Q.sort
51
Table 7 Means and standard deviations of mothers’ attachment scales for each profile and results of the ANOVAs 55 Table 8 Means and standard deviations of fathers’ attachment scales for each profile and results of the ANOVAs 57 Table 9 Means, standard deviations, and results of the ANOVAs of the communication variables for mother-child dyads in the dyadic and triadic context for each attachment profile 60
2
Table 10 Means, standard deviations, and results of the ANOVAs of the communication variables for father-child dyads in the dyadic and triadic context for each attachment profile
61
Table 11 Means and standard deviations of the communication variables in mother-child dyads for each of the four attachment groups 63 Table 12 Means and standard deviations of the communication variables in father-child dyads for each of the four attachment groups 64 Table 13 Results of the ANOVAs on the communication variables for the four attachment groups (simple and double effects) 65 Table 14 Results of the ANOVAs on the communication variables for the four attachment groups (triple and quadruple effects) 66
3
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1 Dyadic context - Frequency distribution of the distance variables
37
Figure 2 Dyadic context - Frequency distribution of the visual orientation variables
38
Figure 3 Dyadic context - Frequency distribution of the body orientation variables
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Figure 4 Dyadic context - Frequency distribution of the dyadic involvement variables
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Figure 5 Triadic context - Frequency distribution of the distance variables
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Figure 6 Triadic context - Frequency distribution of the visual orientation variables
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Figure 7 Triadic context - Frequency distribution of the body orientation variables
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Figure 8 Triadic context - Frequency distribution of the dyadic involvement variables
44
Figure 9 Subject’s clusters as a function of mothers’ attachment Q.sort
53
Figure 10 Subject’s clusters as a function of fathers’ attachment Q.sort
54
4
CHAPTER I
THEORETICAL CONTEXT
1.1. Introduction
For the young child, the family is the most important social context. It is early in life and within the family that the child learns the basic social and communicative skills which will be the base of his/her future social adaptation in the outside world. The family has been extensively investigated by different disciplines, and consequently from various theoretical and methodological perspectives. In our study we approach the family by looking at the relationships between the child and his/her more stable social partners: the parents. The focus of our study is on the communicative and affective dimensions of these relationships. Based on direct observations of parent-child communication behaviors and parent’s perceptions of the affective relationship they have with their child we intend to better understand some of the complexities and interrelations of the child's relationships within the family.
To approach the affective dimension of parent-child relationship we will work within the conceptual framework of attachment theory. In the field of developmental psychology, the attachment relationship between a mother and her children has, certainly, been one of the most studied topics over the last decades. In fact, attachment theory has been the main theoretical framework for understanding the child's socio-affective development and social adaptation over the last 30 years. Attachment research has also
5 shown to be a very prolific area of research with an impressive capacity to renew itself with new questions and to incorporate developments in related areas into its own main issues. On the other hand, research on mother-child communication has brought interesting insights to the field. This work attempts to contribute to new developments in attachment research and to the growing knowledge about the child’s communicative development by focusing on the relationship between mother-child and father-child communication and attachment from a social/communicative perspective and a system approach of human development.
Parent-child relationship will be studied in two different social contexts: within a dyadic context and within what we consider to be the family's main unit: the triad constituted by the child, the mother and the father, or "the primary triangle" (FivazDepeursinge & Corboz-Warnery, 1999). The attachment relationship has rarely been investigated beyond the dyad, especially the mother-child dyad. The observation of the child interacting with both parents will provide a more comprehensive and realistic picture of real life interactive experiences. It will also allow us to better understand the child's attachment organization with both mother and father and its expression in communicative patterns when the child is with the mother and the father at the same time. In addition, it will provide insights about the different roles parents may assume in the family and broaden our understanding about family relationships in general.
In what follows, we will present the main assumptions of attachment theory and some recent developments in mother-child attachment and communication research. We will then discuss recent studies on father-child attachment and systems approach of development with a special focus on contextual influences on the child’s socio-affective development.
6 1.2. Mother-child studies
1.2.1. Mother-child attachment
The theory of attachment was originally formulated by the psychiatrist John Bowlby in his classic book "Attachment and loss" published in 1969. This book was the result of research on the effects of mother-child separation on the child's psychological development sponsored by the World Health Organization after the Second World War. The children studied were living in orphanages. Bowlby observed the ill effects of early mother-child separation on the child's emotional development and explained it through a reelaboration of some basic premises of psychoanalytic theory.
Also influenced by
animal research, and especially by a classic series of experiments conducted by Harry Harlow (1958) on attachment in monkeys, Bowlby questioned Freud's classical view that the child develops attachment to the mother because she is the one who provides food.
Influenced by ethology, Bowlby (1969, 1997) views attachment in humans from an evolutionary perspective. For him, the infant is equipped with a behavioral system that operates to promote sufficient proximity to the primary caregiver (often the mother) whereas the caregiver is endowed with a complementary behavioral system that has the same function. As infants pass through a long period of immaturity, the attachment behavior system is activated to promote the child's proximity to caregiver whenever a danger is imminent, thus increasing the chances of the child's survival. The behavioral system of attachment is constituted by behaviors that have a signaling function of bringing the mother to the infant - crying, smiling, babbling and calling and approach behaviors which take the infant to the mother - following, clinging and sucking. These behaviors are "goal directed" as the attachment behavioral system is structured in terms of "set-goals". Bowlby's conceptualization of a behavioral attachment system is based on a "control systems theory" in which any system may be compared to a machine that operates purposively. As Ainsworth et al. (1978) contend, the "goal" is built into the device by the man who programs it and feedback is the essential mechanism through which the machine achieves its goal. In relation to the attachment system, the setting of
7 the "set-goal" would be the degree of proximity to an attachment figure. In Ainsworth's (1978) words: "when the "set-goal" is set widely, a child may venture a substantial distance from his mother before the set-goal is exceeded, attachment behavior is activated, and specified degree of proximity restored” (p.11).
Bowlby proposed that the biological function of the attachment system is "protection from predators in the environment of evolutionary adaptedness", further arguing that even in our days a child is more vulnerable to accidents if not accompanied by a responsible adult. Ainsworth and her colleagues (1978), as well as others, have extended this idea to include the opportunity for learning as another function of the attachment system based on the interplay between the attachment and exploratory systems. It is when the attachment behavioral system is activated at low intensity that the exploratory system can be activated at a higher level enabling the child to explore the environment.
In the middle of the 1980's, Main, Kaplan and Cassidy (1985) proposed in a classical article a reconceptualization of the attachment organization focusing on individual differences in the mental representation of the self, or, in the internal working model. In that proposal, we observe a shift from traditional analyses, centered on the behavioral level, to a focus on the representational level. Past research had relied, mainly, on observations of the infant's nonverbal behavior toward the parent in a structured separation-and-reunion situation, the Strange Situation, as conceived by Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters and Wall (1978). Main et al. (1985) proposed that reunion responses to parents (in the Strange Situation procedure) can be seen, not only as a "sample" of interaction patterns with the caregiver, but also as indicative of the infant's "view" of his or her relationship with the caregiver. According to them, internal working models are supposed to derive from the child's repeated daily experiences with attachment figures. They are related to the extent to which the parent is sensitive to the child's signal and contingently responsive to them, and are supposed to organize subsequent relationships. Young children who enjoy a secure attachment to their parents develop internal working models of their parents as loving and responsive and of themselves as worthy of love and
8 support. By contrast, children with insecure attachment develop working models of the caregiver as unresponsive and unloving and of themselves as unworthy of nurturance and support (Bretherton, 1985; Cassidy, 1988, 1999). Internal working model also tend to operate outside conscious awareness and resist change, although they can be restructured (Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985).
Historically, research on the attachment relationship has been mostly concerned with two main issues. On one side, scholars have been looking for the origins or the antecedents of the attachment relationship (Ainsworth, 1973, 1978, 1983; Belsky, Rovine, & Taylor,1984; Grossmann, Grossmann, Spangler, Suess, & Unzner, 1985; Isabella, Belsky, & Von Eye, 1989; Kochanska, 1998; Leyendecker, Lamb, Fracasso, Scolmerich & Larson, 1997; Rosen & Rothbaum, 1993; Seifer, Schiller, Sameroff, Resnick, & Riordan, 1996; Smith & Pederson, 1988). These studies are generally based on home observation of mother-child interaction throughout the first year of the child's life, with a focus on the patterns of interaction or behaviors that could predict the quality of attachment relationship evaluated at 1 year of age using the Strange Situation procedure. Based on Ainsworth's early findings, the main idea guiding the majority of these studies is that the quality of the attachment relationship is related to the sensitivity and responsivity of the attachment figure to the infant's signals. Differences in maternal sensitivity and responsivity to the infant's cues during the first year of life seem to be related to qualitatively different patterns of infant-mother attachment at 1 year of age. The principal evidence for the claim that security or insecurity derived from the Strange Situation reflects the quality of the relationship between an infant and its caregiver is Ainsworth's demonstration of correlations between home interaction between mother and infant during the first year of life and Strange Situation classification (Fox, 1991). Since then a number of researchers have substantiated these findings. It has been a consensus among researchers that a secure attachment is fostered by maternal sensitivity whereas less optimal insecure attachments develop in the context of maternal insensitivity. However, it is important to observe that most of the studies evaluate maternal sensitivity by global rating scales, and that some inconsistencies in the attachment-antecedent literature emerge in attempts at operationalizing the construct of maternal sensitivity in
9 terms of measures derived from specific behavioral observations (Isabella, Belsky, & Von Eye, 1989).
Others seem more concerned with understanding the outcomes of the attachment relationship (Cassidy, 1988; Fagot, 1997; Jacobsen & Hofmann, 1997; Kerns, Cole, & Andrews, 1998; Meins & Russell, 1997; Park & Waters, 1989; Teti & Ablard, 1989). Numerous studies have shown relations between the quality of the attachment relationship with a whole series of variables such as social competence in peer relations (Park & Waters, 1989), self-esteem (Cassidy, 1988), and infant-sibling relationships (Teti & Ablard, 1989). For example, Teti and Ablard (1989) investigated the relations between the affective quality of infant-sibling relationship and the security of attachment of both the infant and the older sibling to the mother. They found that secure infants reacted less negatively than insecure infants when mothers turned their attention to the older child, and that infant attachment behavior directed to older sibling occurred only when the older sibling was more secure.
Another important issue in attachment research relates to the processes involved in the formation of the child's internal working model of the attachment relationship. This subject has been at the center of numerous debates. The classical view stresses that the infant has a predisposition to form a primary attachment relationship with his/her main caregiver, usually the mother, that will guide all future relationships, and will remain more important than any other relationship. This theoretical proposition is an example of a hierarchical model of attachment. Alternative models have been proposed in the literature: an integrative model, an independent or multiple model, and a polyadic model. In all of these alternative models, the various relationships the child develops with significant adults (the mother, the father, or other caregivers) are considered and the discussion centers on how they are integrated or not into the child's internal working model. For example, the integrative model proposes that all of the child's relationships are integrated into one mental representation and have a similar impact on the child's development (van Ijzendoorn et al., 1992). Differently, the independent or multiple model stresses the independence of each representation. According to this perspective, the
10 representations of different attachment relationships with significant adults have a different impact on the child's development (Howes, 1999). Finally, the polyadic model considers the different contributions of various attachment relationships on the internal working model and highlights the reciprocal influence of these diverse representations on one another (Strayer et al, 1996). The polyadic model of attachment is inspired by a systemic view of development which will be discussed later.
Recent studies have also challenged the classical view that attachment relationships and internal working models are fully established by the end of the first year of life. The child's attachment relationships and internal working model are seen as elaborated in the course of the child's development by continuous co-construction processes and many efforts are now devoted to better understand these processes. The communicative episodes involving an exchange of affect and communicative signals between the child and his/her multiple social partners are likely to play an important role. The assumption underlying our study is that the constant social transactions between the child and his/her multiple social partners will result in transformations of the nature of his or her attachment bonds and internal working model. We assume a polyadic model as we consider that the child's internal working model is not elaborated only in the course of the child's interaction with his/her mother. Although these ideas contrast with the classical position on attachment, the most prominent researchers in the field have already introduced them in earlier writings. For example, according to Ainsworth et al. (1978), "whatever constitutional organization is present at birth becomes substantially modified and elaborated through experience, and that individual differences in experience may be presumed to result in different patterns of organization". Moreover, Bowlby (in Ainsworth et al., 1978) proposed that all infant's behavior systems would change considerably with the development of communication, especially with the acquisition of language, and with cognitive development, especially the development of internal working models.
The focus on the contribution of multiple social partners in the formation of the child's internal working model leads, necessarily, to the study of the different social
11 contexts the child experiences in early infancy and to the study of the child's multiple social interactions within these social contexts. For most children, the family is the most important social context, and the parents are the child's more constant and stable social partners. Given the primacy of these relationships in early infancy, the main objective of our study is to further understand the communicative and affective dynamics within the family. In sum, it is our position that internal working models of attachment relationships are social in nature and that they are elaborated and co-constructed in the course of the child's social interaction with multiple social partners through communicative processes.
From this theoretical perspective, the understanding of the attachment relationship has to involve, necessarily, a comprehension of what is happening between social partners, and it demands a closer look at the communicative transactions occurring between the child and his/her parents. Attachment research has been, mostly, focused either on the mother's response to the infant's signals, guided by its main assumption that the mother's response to the infant's signals is the basis of a secure or insecure attachment relationship, or on the child's behavior during reunion episodes of the Strange Situation with the objective of classifying the children into pre-determined attachment organizational types (A, B, C, and D). A focus on the mother's response reflects a concern with one side of mother-child interaction, while the child's classification into different attachment types illustrates a preoccupation at understanding the other side of motherchild interaction. Although attachment has been conceptualized as a relationship construct, very few attachment studies were concerned with more dynamic aspects of mother-child communication in which the joint contribution of both partners were considered equally. Moreover, the correspondence between parent-child communicative dynamics and the quality of the attachment relationship has rarely been investigated. Given the surprisingly and unjustified little information in the literature about parentchild
communicative
processes
related
to
attachment,
especially
father-child
communication and attachment, it is our intention to further understand the communication within the family as it relates to attachment.
12
1.2.2. Mother-child communication and attachment: A case of mutual influences
Research on communication within the developmental psychology literature has been primarily concerned with mother-child early communication. The first studies reported the highly synchronized interaction between the mother and the child (Bateson, 1979; Beebe, 1982; Beebe, Alson, Jaffe, Feldstein, & Crown, 1985; Blicharski, 1991; Bruner, 1976, 1983; Feider, Blicharski, Darjan, & Strayer, 1989; Kaye, 1980, 1982; Schaffer, 1977; Trevarthen, 1977, 1979, 1998). Developmental psychologists have shown that from the very beginning of the infant’s life the mother considers the infant a competent interlocutor, simulating and exaggerating conversations. The mother interprets the child’s actions and vocalizations, thereby constructing a "protoconversation" long before the child can participate on an equal basis in the interaction. A meaning is given by the adult to the child's every movement in an attempt to fulfill the infant's turn in the conversation and create a semblance of dialogue. Although the mother has a more important role in the construction of early mother-child communication, the child is not a passive interlocutor. In a classic study, Kaye (1980) has emphasized the influence of the child on the caretaker's behavior. For example, he has shown how the rhythmic pattern of mother's breastfeeding behavior is controlled by the child. It is through this highly synchronized interaction with the mother that the infant can actively participate in the social world. Proto-conversation was first noted by Bateson as she analyzed mother-infant vocal exchanges (Bateson, 1979). In her words: "the mother and infant (7-15 weeks of age) were collaborating in a pattern of more or less alternating, nonoverlapping vocalization, the mother speaking brief sentences and the infant responding with coos and murmurs, together producing a brief joint performance similar to conversation, which I called protoconversation" (Bateson, 1979). Since then, a large amount of research has substantiated her original findings.
13 Although rarely subjected to empirical verification, it has been suggested by many researchers that matching and coordinating the timing of communicative behaviors facilitates interpersonal attraction, empathy, and social relatedness. Furthermore, the timing and rhythm in early mother-infant interaction were considered by many researchers to be the basis of the infant's development, including the formation of attachment bonds and self-regulation of his/her own states of arousal and affect (Stern, Beebe, Jaffe, & Bennet, 1977, among others). Recently, Jaffe, Beebe, Feldstein, Crown, and Jasnow (2001) undertook a main project with the objective of filling what they call a "critical gap in the literature", which is the study of variations in mother-infant rhythmic coordination with infant outcomes such as attachment and cognition. Their main hypothesis was that the degree of vocal rhythm coordination between the 4-month-old infant and the adult should predict outcomes (cognitive and affective) at 12 months of age. The researchers proposed that vocal rhythm coordination is important for attachment formation and transmission. The authors’ findings confirm their hypothesis. In fact, low, moderate, and high degrees of vocal coordination had different implications for attachment security. Specifically, midrange interactive coordination was optimal for infant attachment whereas high or low degrees of coordination were more related to disordered interactions.
In face of these results, the authors propose that midrange
coordination of the partner's vocal parameters may leave "more room for uncertainty, initiative, and flexibility" (p.107) and that attachment outcomes are favoured when the interaction occurs in a "looser atmosphere" as opposed of a tight or very loose coordination. Results are discussed in light of a conceptualization of development from a systems perspective with an emphasis on the contribution of both partner's on the coconstruction of the attachment relationship.
Observing early differences in mother-infant patterns of communication and synchronization, several attachment researchers had already suggested that there might be a relationship between parent-child communication and attachment. This idea is present in Bowlby's later writings (1988) and has been further developed by Isabella, Belsky, and Von Eye (1989). For example, Isabella, Belsky, and Von Eye (1989) hypothesized that mother-child synchronization could be considered a good index of the nature of the
14 attachment relationship between the mother and the child. Looking for the interactional antecedents of attachment quality, these authors predicted specific associations between mother-child interaction over the first year of the infant's life and attachment measures at 12 months of age using the Strange Situation procedure. Based on a definition of interactional synchrony as "the extent to which interaction appears to be reciprocal and mutually rewarding", the authors hypothesized that the frequent occurrence of synchronous interactions would foster development of the infant's internal working model of the mother as "available, responsive, and trustworthy". In general, it was demonstrated that secure attachment relationships were fostered by synchronous interactions whereas insecure dyads were more asynchronous in their interactive exchanges. The idea of synchrony is related to the notion of dyadic adjustment between the social partners. Synchrony has been referred to in the literature as "the smooth meshing of interaction" (Bernieri & Rosenthal, 1991).
According to these authors, various aspects of
interpersonal behavior show synchronizing characteristics that may enhance efficiency with which humans interact with one another. So, a synchronous interaction is an interaction in which there is an optimal adjustment between the social partners.
Bretherton (1995) and True et al. (2001) also contend that parent-child communication patterns have a strong influence on children's security of attachment and emotional development. They conceptualize the attachment relationships as emerging and developing in the context of close relationships by co-constructive processes between the child and his/ her multiple social partners. Communication problems in close relationships may lead to difficulties in the co-construction of the attachment relationship it-self, and eventually, to insecurity of attachment. This idea goes back to Bowlby's insights and his emphasis on real events and real world experiences as opposed to Freud's interest in intrapsychic phenomena. In Bowlby's view, the internal working model is a representation or a model of the interaction developed between the child and his or her caregivers (cited by Oppenheim & Waters, 1995). This representation is supposed to be based on the perceptions of the child's actual interpersonal environment and not on internal fantasies. Following Bowlby's thoughts, Bretherthon (1995) suggests that by the middle of the second year, children routinely abstract from recurring everyday life events
15 representations of their expectations about typical outcomes. In this view, what seems to be important is the every day transactions between the child and his/her caregivers, and communication is an essential aspect of these transactions. Although not explicit, the idea of the relationship between parent-child communication and attachment is also present in the earlier works in the field. Ainsworth, for example, reasoned that different organizations of attachment relationships develop on the basis of different interactive events. Implied in this reasoning is the idea that attachment relationship develops, as Bowlby earlier suggested, by recurring every day interactions which are permeated by patterns of communication.
True, Pisani, and Oumar (2001) developed a procedure to test what they refer to as a "Communication Hypothesis" which states that individuals in secure and insecure attachment relationships communicate differently in attachment related circumstances. The authors used a naturally occurring mildly stressful situation to observe infant-mother communication. Mothers and infants were filmed during an infant exam, which consisted primarily in weighing the infant (Weigh-In), and in a brief maternal interview about the infant's health in a traditional West African agrarian population, the Dogon of Mali. This study was designed, in part, to test whether mothers and infants in secure and insecure attachment relationships would show different patterns of communication during the Weigh-In exam. The authors predicted that differences in infant attachment would be linked to differences in mother-infant communication. The Weigh-In was coded using four rating scales of infant communication (directedness of signaling, avoidance, resistance and disorganization) and four rating scales of maternal communication (cooperation, withdrawal, overriding of infant negativity, and frightened or frightening behaviors). A summary measure was created based on Grice's communication theory (1975) in which some of the infant's communicative behaviors and also some of the mother's communicative behaviors were considered "communication violations" as they violate the communication norms of coherence and cooperativeness. For example, infant avoidance and maternal withdrawal were considered communication violations. Their findings indicate that mothers and infants in secure and insecure attachment relationships communicated differently during the exam. Communication violations were rarely
16 observed when the child was classified as secure in the Strange Situation procedure. The opposite pattern was found when the infant was classified as insecure. Either the mother, the infant, or both presented more communication violations. It is important to observe that the hypothesis outlined above refers only to life events involving a certain degree of stress referred by the author as attachment related circumstances.
The current study is included in this line of research. It is based on a communicative/social perspective on attachment in which the attachment relationship is conceptualized as emerging and developing in the context of close relationships by social construction between the child and his/her parents and deeply rooted in communicative processes. To assume the social/transactional nature of attachment leads necessarily to a need of considering the communicative dynamics between the parent and the child. I am primarily concerned at deepening the actual state of knowledge about the relation between parent-child communication and attachment. What differentiates the communicative dynamics of secure dyads as opposed to insecure dyads is still not completely understood, especially after the child's first year of life. So, the first objective of this study is to describe the patterns of parent-child communication that characterize a secure attachment relationship as opposed to an insecure one within the family system. Fathers as well as mothers will be included in our study. The second objective of our study is thus to compare father-child and mother-child communicative dynamics in secure and insecure dyads.
1.3. Father-child attachment
The father has been neglected in traditional developmental psychology. As Lamb (1981) has pointed out, fathers are "the forgotten contributors to child development". Recently, with the growing recognition that mother-child interaction is not the only social system that influences individual development, researchers have been paying more attention to the role of the father on the child’s development (Batolato,1997; Bourçois,
17 1997; Dubeau & Moss, 1998; Frascarolo, 1997; Lamb, 1989, 1997; Le Camus, 1997; Maccoby & Martin, 1983; Martin, 2001; Rogé, 1997).
The first studies on attachment research to include the father were preoccupied at establishing if the child could develop an attachment relationship with the father. The results demonstrated that the father could be an attachment figure as much as the mother and that the child could be attached to more than one person. The studies that followed were comparative ones in which the main research question was whether an infant's attachment classification with one parent was related to or independent of the attachment classification with the other parent. Fox, Kimmerly, and Schaffer (1991), in a metaanalysis including 11 studies, reported concordance in only three of these 11 samples. Although there are some inconsistencies in the literature, most researchers report independence in the attachment classification to the mother and to the father. These data have been used to argue for the lack of influence of infant temperament on the quality of the attachment relationship and to reinforce the claim that an attachment, secure or insecure, reflects the interactional history of an infant with his/her caregiver. Mothers and fathers often interact differently with their child and these differences in interactive styles may be reflected in independence of attachment classification with the mother and the father.
There is an abundance of data on the history of mother-infant relationship. In comparison, we know very little about the history of father-infant relationship as it relates to attachment. One of the first studies looking at the origins of infant-father security of attachment is an unpublished one done by Belsky in 1983 (Cox, Owen, Henderson, & Margand, 1992). Belsky found no relation between quality of infant-father attachment and father-infant interactional experience and he suggested that this lack of association may be due, in part, to the measurement of inappropriate dimensions. As variables traditionally considered in mother-infant attachment research (sensitivity, responsivity, and warmth) were used, he proposed that other variables may predict the development of secure infant-father attachment. Other studies replicated these findings and reported no association between father's sensitivity and infant's attachment security (Easterbrooks &
18 Goldberg, 1984; Grossman & Grossman, 1992; Rosen & Rothbaum, 1993; Voling & Belsky, 1992).
As Belsky had suggested, Cox, Owen, Henderson, and Margand (1992) found that security of the infant-father attachment relationship at 1 year was indeed predicted from the nature of infant-father interaction earlier in the 1st year when variables such as reciprocal play, activity level, physical affection, and appropriate encouragement for achievement were examined in situations such as whole family interactions. The authors emphasized the importance of exploring dimensions of the interaction that are known to be more characteristic of father-child interaction. Similarly, Easterbrooks and Goldberg (1984) reported that security of attachment with the father was related to paternal play and problem-solving interaction with the child. However, when all of the available studies on the association of father's sensitivity and infant-father attachment are taken together, a small but significant effect of paternal sensitivity comes out as van Ijzendoorn and DeWolff’s (1997) meta-analysis of eight studies indicates. But, as the authors pointed out, the association between paternal sensitivity and infant-father attachment is weaker than the association between maternal sensitivity and infant-mother attachment.
Taken together, these studies reveal that paternal sensitivity is only moderately related to the child's security, and that other types of father's behaviors may be more influential in determining the child's security. In fact, which father's behaviors are important for the child's security is not clearly understood and certainly more research is needed in order to clarify the father's impact on the child's quality of attachment. As George and Solomon (1999) have concluded "...the nature of the attachment and caregiving systems in the father-child relationship remains somewhat of a mystery".
1.4. Systems approach of development
The inclusion of the father in attachment research can be understood considering the shift, specifically in developmental psychology, and more broadly, in all social
19 sciences, from unidirectional, to bi-directional and, more recently, to a systemic view of development. A system approach can be understood as an extension of bi-directional views where mutual influences are considered in the understanding of human interactions.
Systems approach was, initially, applied by clinical psychologists to
understand family relationships. For example, family therapists will try to understand a troubled child as a manifestation of a family disturbance and not as a problem that should lie only in the child. According to this perspective, "all individuals and relationships within the family interactively and reflexively shape all other members and relationships" (Stafford & Bayer, 1993). A system theory of development proposes that the elements of the system are in a continuous process of exchange and that these coactions result in rearrangements between the components of the system increasing its complexity. The systemic approach also considers the influence of sociocultural and historical aspects on individuals and relationships (Belsky et al., 1984, 1999; Bronfenbrenner, 1969, 1986, 1993; Rossetti-Ferreira, Amorin, Silva, & Carvalho, 2004).
A systemic approach that has influenced attachment research is the ecological perspective of Bronfenbrenner (1969, 1986, 1993). According to this perspective, the child is immersed in a social context in which he/she interacts with multiple partners. These interactions are supposed to influence and be influenced by one another. It is in the context of these multiple interactions that the child develops affective relationships and, thus, attachment relationships and not only in the context of the interaction between the child and his/her primary caretaker. This theoretical perspective broadens research on attachment by enlarging the scope of the traditional research, including the child in a wider social context in which his/her affective relationships are co-constructed and maintained by multiple social partners. From this perspective an analysis of the child's development can not be restricted to the study of mother-child attachment relationship but has to consider the contribution of the larger social context in which multiple relationships are developed. Contrary to the classical view on attachment in which the mother-child attachment relationship is considered the main influence on the child's future social adaptation, and thus is the only social system included in the analysis, this perspective highlights the diversity of the child's social experience emphasizing the
20 importance and advantage of multiple attachment relationships for the individual social adaptation (Bronfenbrenner, 1993; Strayer, 1984; Wozniak, 1993).
The influence of systemic approaches on attachment research can be observed in a whole series of recent studies preoccupied at understanding the influences of the child’s wider context on parent-child attachment relationship (Belsky, 1999; Martin, 2001) and the consideration of the child’s multiple attachment relationships (Rosen & Burke, 1999). For example, Martin (2001), based on an ecological view of the child's development, examined the contribution of some aspects of the family ecology (socialization practices and the child's temperament) on the nature of the attachment relationship between the child and his/her mother and father. The results revealed that conflicting socialization practices were related to an attachment relationship perceived by both parents as difficult and negative and with infant difficulties at establishing social contacts. In addition, a relation between parent's socialization practices and the child's temperament was evident in the data analysis. In general, conflicting and rigid socialization practices were associated with temperamental traits usually considered "difficult". Moreover, it was found that a rigid and conflicting family tends to be characterized by less harmonious parent-child affective relations in which children are described as insecure, dependent, and with little social competence.
Other examples can be seen in the recent work of Rossetti-Ferreira, Amorin, Silva, and Carvalho (2004), Rossetti-Ferreira, Ramon, and Barreto (2002), Rossetti-Ferreira, Amorin, and Silva (1999). According to Rossetti-Ferreira et al. (1999, 2002, 2004), the context should not be considered a simple background to individual processes but it should be integrated into the analyses of individual processes. The context and the social relationships within the context are “constructive factors” of human beings. Based on Bronfenbrenner, and also on Vygotsky and Wallon, Rossetti-Ferreira and her colleagues proposed that the social and historical aspects of the context are materialized within the individual by dialogical processes involving semiotic representations of the culture. In their perspective, communicative processes are conceived as a bridge between the
21 individual and the context which are interrelated in a continuous process of mutual coconstruction.
1.5. Contextual influences: Dyads x triads
Current systems theories also emphasize the central role of context in the shaping of developmental trajectories and consider context sensitivity as one of the "key dimensions of a system" (Bronfenbrenner, 1969, 1986, 1993; Gottlieb, 1991). It has been argued that the individual's capacities can be modified by changes in the immediate surroundings. Regarding the study of social interaction, family systems theory postulates that the person behaves differently according to the context in which he/she is immersed. As McHale and Cowan (1996) put it: "family members interacting together as a group may display patterns of behavior that differ from those evidenced when individuals or family dyads are studied in isolation". Family researchers highlight that a full understanding of the child’s functioning demand a broader perspective (McHale, 1995, 1996, 1998, 2000; Minuchin, 1985, 1988).
The importance of considering multiple social contexts in the study of human development is now recognized by developmental psychologists, but, traditionally, research in the area of child development has focused almost exclusively on one single interactive context - the mother-child dyad. According to McHale, Kuersten, and Lauretti (1996), the primacy of the study of dyadic relationships within Developmental Psychology was guided by some of the most influential psychological theories such as the relational theories of Sullivan, Winnicott, and Bowlby. It was only during the late 1970s and early 1980s that a focus on triads and family groups emerged in the child development literature with the recognition that the mother-child dyad was only a subsystem of the family unit. Whole-family analyses are becoming more popular in child development studies and in the attachment literature. This approximation between attachment theory and systems theory can be seen as a natural partnership as Wood
22 (2000) points out: "Attachment theory has, for the most part, not been conceptualized, nor researched, systemically, despite the fact that attachment theory is a systems theory".
In the same way that attachment researchers are flirting with family systems theory, we are witnessing serious attempts at integrating attachment theory into the body of knowledge of family systems theories. An example of this effort is the recent special issue of the journal Family Process entitled "Attachment and Family Systems" (Wood, 2002). An interesting proposition on how to integrate attachment theory and family systems theory comes from Kozlowska and Hanney (2002), who argue that the relationship between these two areas could be conceived using the "network paradigm" a general systems theory applied to living systems. As they explain, living systems have two basic characteristics. First, they have "a tendency to form multileveled structures of systems within system" (Kozlowska & Hanney, 2002). In other words, each system is at the same time distinct from other systems and part of a more complex system that is also distinct from the subsystems. Second, "each system structure varies in complexity and is governed by different kinds of laws which are specific to that system structure" (Kozlowska & Hanney, 2002). These characteristics of a living system lead, consequently, to important differences in the observed phenomena at each level of complexity. In addition, different levels of complexity within a system are interrelated and one can not exist without the other.
The network model can be easily applied to understand family relations and the different subsystems within the family. For example, the individuals within a family maintain relations with each other in different situations (e. g. mother-child dyad, motherfather-child triad, husband-wife dyad). Each one of these specific interactional contexts may represent distinct "system structures" or "levels of complexity" characterized by differing complexity with its own laws. Each level of complexity presents patterns that do not exhibit at the other level. In addition, each level of complexity forms a whole, while simultaneously constituting a part. For example, the dyad could be considered at the same time, as a "whole" system with its own laws and properties and it could also be considered as "part" of a bigger system (the dyad as part of the family system). Based on
23 these considerations, we conclude that attachment researchers have provided a considerable amount of information about that specific level of complexity - the motherchild dyad- but very few information about other levels of the family system. An integration of attachment theory and family systems theory demands that attachment researchers look also at other levels of the family system (e.g. father-child dyad, triad, family as a whole), as well as the relationship between them. Based on this model, a complete description of the attachment relationship within the family has to take into consideration all these different levels of complexity (dyad, triad, family), and the interrelation between them. Given this state of things it is our objective to approach mother-child and father-child communication as a function of attachment quality in a dyadic social situation and in a triadic context in which the mother, the father and the child are observed together.
Several studies document the interactional patterns within mother-child and fatherchild dyads as well as within mother-father-child triads (Belsky, 1979; Clarke-Stewart, 1978; Corboz-Warnery, Fivaz-Depeursinge, Betens, & Favez, 1993; Gjerde, 1986; Golinkoff & Ames, 1979, Liddell, 1987; McHale, 1995; McHale & Cowan, 1996; Pederson, 1980; Pellegrini et al., 1987; Sun, Li-Ching, & Roopnarine, 1996). There is agreement in the literature regarding the changes in the behaviors directed to the child by each parent when both parents are observed interacting together with the child. In general, both parents seem to decrease the amount of behavior directed to the child when the mother, the father, and the child are together. Mothers were found to be less engaging and responsive to their children in triadic social contexts (Clarke-Stewart, 1978) whereas fathers were found to be less demanding (e. g. they reacted less often to children’s violations of conversational rules) (Pellegrini et al., 1987). Father’s behavior is also more likely to change than mother’s in triadic situations. They also tend to adopt a style of interaction more characteristic of the mother (Pellegrini et al., 1987). These results suggest that fathers are more affected by the mother’s presence than mothers are affected by the father’s presence, and that fathers seem to accommodate and adapt to the mother’s styles. However, important changes in maternal behavior have also been reported in triadic contexts.
24
For instance, Gjerde (1986) reports systematic changes in the quality of parentadolescent interactions when the dyads subsystems (mother-adolescent and fatheradolescent) were observed in the whole family context. Specifically, the quality of fatherson interactions declined in the presence of the mother, while the quality of mother-son interactions improved in the presence of the father. The same trend was not found for daughters. Similarly, McHale, Kuersten, and Lauretti (1996) report variability in parental expressions of positive and negative emotions during whole-family interactions compared to dyadic interactions (parent-child) in a study of family members' emotional expressiveness in different contexts. In this study, some parents (more often the mothers) presented differences in expressiveness from dyadic to whole-family contexts. Specifically, mothers' use of affective terms decreased in the presence of fathers. The authors call for the need of considering both parent-child and whole-family processes for a full understanding of the child's interactional experience. In their words: "a full picture of the "culture" in which children learn about relationships must necessarily include both dyadic and whole-family contexts.
Given that parents interact differently with their child depending on the interactional context, parent-child interactions should be observed in various contexts. In this study, we will be looking at mother-child and father-child communication in a dyadic context and in a triadic context where the mother, the father and the child are observed together. Considering the focus on parent-child dyads in attachment research, the observation of mother-child and father-child communicative dynamics as a function of attachment quality within the triad constituted by the mother, the father and the child contribute to enlarge the boundaries of attachment research and to elucidate the network of attachments within the family. In addition, the observation of parent-child communicative dynamics across social contexts contributes to understand the impact of social contexts on the relation between parent-child communication and attachment classification. In this study, we examine more specifically the communicative transactions between the mother, the father and their preschool child as a function of the quality of their attachment relationship with a special focus on the impact of the context.
25
1.6. Communicating through nonverbal signals
Although speech may play a central role in human communication, the importance of nonverbal signals in the course of a conversation has been widely recognized (Argyle & Cook, 1976; Darwin, 1872; Hinde, 1972; Roten, Darwish, Stern, Fivaz-Depeursinge, & Corboz-Warnery, 1999). According to Argyle (1976), a major function of nonverbal signals in human communication is the managing of the immediate social situation. As Abercrombie wrote: "we speak with our vocal organs, but we converse with our whole body" (In Argyle & Cook, 1976). Nonverbal behaviors are also considered to be "particularly appropriate to express affective communication" (Roten et al., 1999). For instance, partners are closer and are more likely to interact face-to-face when their relationship is more intimate, more positive or at a deeper level (Roten et al., 1999).
The current study focuses on nonverbal signals such as physical proximity, visual and body orientation, and shared activities. These nonverbal signals are considered as indicators of the dyadic adjustment between the parents and the child, the quality of their communication, and their emotional and social availability. As it is our intention to describe the communicative dynamics between the parents and their child, a major preoccupation during the elaboration of our taxonomy was with keeping the dyad as the unit of analysis. Following Hinde’s (1979) definition of relationship as "a series of interactions between two people occurring over a period of time", all our measures are intended to provide a picture of what is happening between both social partners in the course of their social interaction. A relationship is inherently dyadic, and a description of it has to include, necessarily, dyadic measures and not individual measures. Unfortunately, the majority of studies focusing on parent-child interaction used measures of individual behaviors, even when the relationship was conceptualized as dyadic (Hinde, 1972; Park & Waters, 1989). The recent work of Jaffe, Beebe, Feldstein, Crow, and Jasnow (2001) presented earlier and the research conducted by Fogel and his colleagues (2004) are rare examples of a dyadic approach.
26
1.7. Objectives and hypotheses
The main objective of our study is
to
document the child's
early
social/communicative experience within the family as a function of his/her attachment organization with the mother and with the father.
Mother-child and father-child
communication behaviors are examined in a dyadic and in a triadic social context (mother, father, and child). We first describe their physical proximity, visual and body orientation, and the time spent in shared activity in each context. We also compare these communicative behaviors across contexts. We then compare secure and insecure dyads. According to our hypothesis, secure dyads should interact more closely than insecure dyads. Parents and children in secure dyads should also show more body and visual orientation and should be more engaged in shared activities.
The context of interaction should also have an impact on parent-child patterns of nonverbal communication. Father-child communication is expected to significantly differ from mother-child communication in the dyadic social context. Consistent with previous findings that fathers adapt to the mothers’ communicative style in triadic situations, mother-child and father-child communication should be more similar in the triadic social context.
In order to understand the communicative dynamics within the family, and consistent with a family system perspective on attachment, we finally consider the combined attachment representations of both parents and their relation with the communicative patterns observed. We thus compare mother-child and father-child dyads constituted by children with a secure attachment to both parents, mother-child and fatherchild dyads constituted by children with insecure attachment to both parents, and motherchild and father-child dyads constituted by children with a secure attachment to one parent and an insecure attachment to the other parent. Given the lack of attachment studies including behavioral observations of mother-child and father-child interaction it is
27 difficult to propose specific hypotheses regarding the association between parent-child communication and attachment relationship. Nevertheless, we expect to find, especially in the triadic context, significantly more physical proximity, visual, and body orientation, and shared activities with both the mother and the father for children who are securely attached to both of their parents than for children who have an insecure attachment to both parents or to one of their parents. Children who have an insecure attachment to both parents should have a more distant communication with them.
28
CHAPTER II
METHODOLOGY
The data for this study were collected in Montréal in the context of a larger research project at the Laboratory of Human Ethology under the direction of Dr. F. F. Strayer at the Université du Québec à Montréal. The main objective of this project was to understand the impact of early social experiences on the child's social functioning.
2.1. Participants
Forty-two families (mother, father, and child) were selected from the original sample considering the availability of data on the child's interaction with both mother and father. The children were, on average, 32 months of age (SD = 2.4). From these 42 children, 25 are boys and 17 are girls. All the families participating in this research lived in the Montréal area and had a middle class socio-economic status according to North America standards. The majority of our sample came from a French-Canadian background, with only four families coming from other ethnical origins. These families were also included in this study as they reflect the multicultural characteristics of Canadian society. All of the subjects were fluent in the French language and had been living in Montréal for at least two years.
29 2.2. Procedure
The parents and their 32 month-old child participated in a laboratory situation which consisted of a series of nine short periods described below. Three of these periods are used in our study: the familiarization period in which the child is observed in a free play situation with both mother and father (triadic context), and two free play dyadic contexts in which the child is observed playing with his or her mother and with his or her father. The same types of toys were provided for all three periods. Each situation was videotaped.
Description of the laboratory visit
1. Familiarization. The child, the mother, and the father are playing together (10 minutes). 2. Painting activity. The child, the mother, and the father are invited to participate in a painting session (15 minutes). 3. Cleaning. Cleaning material is offered to the family (5 minutes). 4. Snack. Juice and biscuits are offered to the family (10 minutes). 5. Free play. The child is observed in a free play situation with his /her mother while the father answers a questionnaire in another room (20 minutes). 6. Free play. The child is observed in a free play situation with his/her father while the mother answers a questionnaire in another room (15 minutes). 7. Cleaning. The child, the mother and the father are asked to tidy up the room (10 minutes). 8. Strange person. A stranger to the child enters the room, asks the parents to leave, and then offers a toy to the child (5 minutes). 9. Parents return. The parents return to the room (5 minutes).
30 2.3. Elaboration of the taxonomy
The taxonomy that has been used in this study was developed at the Laboratory of Human Ethology at the Université du Québec à Montréal by a post-doctoral student, a doctoral student, and the author of the present project. In what follows, I will describe all the steps involved in the building of the taxonomy. First, we watched the videotapes with the objective of getting familiar with our research subjects, their communicative behaviors, and interactive patterns. A list of the communicative behaviors that seemed relevant to the research question was done. From this list, several communicative behaviors were selected and then grouped into larger categories: physical proximity, visual orientation, body orientation, and dyadic involvement. The taxonomy and a description of each specific level or behaviors in these categories are presented below on table 1.
31
Table 1 Taxonomy of nonverbal communication
DISTANCE
1 2 3 4
less than 10 cm between the social partners between 10 cm and 1 m between 1 to 2 m more than 2 m
VISUAL ORIENTATION
1 2 3 4 5
the social partners look at each other unilateral, child looks at parent unilateral, parent looks at child or object close to the child the social partners look in the same direction the social partners look in different directions
BODY ORIENTATION
1 2 3 4 5
the social partners face each other unilateral, child faces parent unilateral, parent faces child the social partners face the same direction the social partners face different directions
DYADIC INVOLVEMENT
1 2 3 4 5
joint activity (involving manipulation of the same object) unilateral behavior (gesture or talk), initiated by the child towards the parent unilateral behavior (gesture or talk), initiated by the parent towards the child joint attention (involving attention to the same object but not manipulation) no involvement
32 2.4. Coding procedure
The coding of the videotapes was done using a time-sampling procedure. Every 10 seconds, a behavior from each of the categories was noted for each one of the dyads (mother-child, father-child) in the dyadic and in the triadic contexts. Eight minutes of social interaction were coded for each social context.
Three observers coded the videotapes after a training period. For the training period, some videotapes were selected and coded by the three coders together with the objective of creating precise coding rules. Some videotapes coded by the three coders together were then selected randomly and became references for the Kappa test of interobserver agreement that was calculated. The Kappa test was applied for the three coders together (Kappa = 70%) and for the dyads of coders (Kappa = 80%). Ten videotapes were used for the Kappa test. The rest of the videotapes was coded separately by the observers.
2.5. Evaluation of the quality of the attachment relationship
Most research on attachment uses the Strange Situation procedure elaborated by Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall (1978) to measure differences in the attachment quality. However, this procedure was conceived to be used with children ranging from 12 to 18 months of age. With the growing interest in attachment in older children, other instruments were developed. Basically, there are two kinds of instruments used with older children: the attachment Q.sort (Waters & Deane, 1985), and different versions of an instrument designed to assess internal working models using a narrative approach (Bretherton, Ridgeway, & Cassidy, 1990; Cassidy, 1988; Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985).
We chose the Q.sort because it was especially designed for children older than those generally assessed using the Strange Situation (12-48 months). Furthermore, it includes items related to the child’s social and emotional functioning in general providing an interesting description of the child’s behavior and functioning as a social partner. It is
33 composed of 100 descriptive items referring to the child's use of their parents as a "secure base", or about the relationship between the child's exploration of the environment and proximity to the parents. As it is completed by the parents, this instrument allows the evaluation of the parent's subjective impressions of the attachment relationship developed with their child. The quality of the attachment relationship was evaluated using a French translation of the first version of the Q.sort. The French translation of the original instrument was done according to the required steps of validation by Jacques, Moss, and Trudel (1988) (French translation, English translation of the French version, correction of the items presenting comprehension problems, and finally, new French translation).
Each parent completed the questionnaire on a portable computer during a home visit when the child was, on average, 25 months (SD = 3.28). The research assistant was present while the parents completed the questionnaire to help with the manipulation of the computer and to answer their questions. The parents were instructed not to talk to each other while completing the questionnaire. The procedure for completing the questionnaire was different from the one traditionally employed. Traditionally, the parents are forced to place the descriptive items in pre-determined categories. In our computerized version of the questionnaire the answer to each item is marked on a 10 points scale (Lickert scale), depending on its similarity to the child's behavior. In addition, in our computerized French version, the items do not refer, exclusively, to the mother. They are addressed to the person who is completing the questionnaire without specifying if it is the mother or the father. From the sample of 42 children, 36 had the Q.sort completed by the mother and 30 children had the Q. sort completed also by the father.
The attachment Q. sort data has been, traditionally, analyzed according to criterion scores proposed for different constructs, such as security, dependency, sociability and social desirability (Dubeau & Moss, 1998; Strayer et al., 1995; Waters & Deane, 1985). The criterion score is the average of the scores obtained by experts in Developmental Psychology asked to describe a 36 months old child, using the Q. sort, in relation to a given construct, for example, a child with a high security attachment relationship. The distribution of the Q. sort cards for each one of the parents is correlated to the distribution
34 of the Q. sort cards done by the experts. This correlation provides, for example, a security score of the child's attachment relationship with each parent from -1,00 to 1,00. The "security scores" are, then, usually broken down into two groups: more secure and less secure.
Concerned with the issue of diversity in human experience, Strayer, Veríssimo, Vaughn, and Howes (1995) proposed an alternative type of analyses for the Q. sort data that would allow a more detailed picture of the diversity of the child's early social functioning in parent-child social context. They proposed that the attachment Q. sort could also be used to identify coherent, homogenous subgroups of children who appear similar on multiple facets of early social behavior, permitting the identification of homogenous subsets of individuals who would share a particular type of social experience. Based on the conceptual content areas suggested by Waters and Deane (1985), Strayer et al. (1995) derived descriptive scales from the Q.sort by identifying specific items that served as indices of Waters and Deane's conceptual content areas. As Strayer et al. (1995) explained it is also possible to extract items from the Q. sort that share common themes and to sum across these items to derive a score for that theme. Waters and Deane (1985) identified eight content themes in the original 100-item Q-sort (attachment/exploration balance, differential responsiveness to caregiver, affect expression,
social
involvement,
object
use,
independence/dependence,
social
perceptiveness, and endurance/resilience) and suggested items from the original Q-sort associated with those themes. Strayer's et al. (1995) derivation of the descriptive scales from the Q.sort required identifying specific items potentially related to the content areas proposed by Waters and Deane (1985). After a series of procedures and analyses fully documented in Strayer et al. (1995), seven of the eight original scales were retained for further analyses (proximity/exploration balance, differential responsiveness to caregiver, positive affect, sociability, independence, social perceptiveness, endurance). Each child received a score for each one of the descriptive scales constituted by the mean of the items of each scale. In this study the attachment Q.sort data were analyzed according to the procedure proposed by Strayer et al. (1995) which includes dimensions of the child’s
35 social and emotional behavior that are not considered in the traditional analyses based on the criterion scores. It thus provides a detailed picture of the child’s social functioning.
36
CHAPTER III
RESULTS
The results pertaining to the communication patterns observed in mother-child and father-child dyads in the dyadic and triadic contexts are presented first, followed by the results on attachment classification. The results of the analyses comparing the communication patterns of secure and insecure dyads are presented in the last section.
3.1. Communication data
3.1.1. Data reduction
Two data banks were created. The first one consists of the relative frequency scores for each variable in each category: physical proximity, visual orientation, body orientation, and dyadic involvement. Each of these categories comprises distinct levels or dyadic patterns. The frequency of occurrence of each of these levels or dyadic patterns was first computed and then divided by the total frequency of the codes for each category. The results are presented in percentages. The relative frequency scores provide a detailed view of the patterns of communication observed in mother-child and father-child dyads in each context.
37 The second data bank consists of the mean values of each category for each dyad (mother-child and father-child) in each context (dyadic and triadic). To obtain these mean values, a recodification of the original data was necessary. The distinct levels or dyadic patterns within each category were recoded into a four-point grading scale reflecting different “levels” of communication. The low numbers of the scale reflect a more favorable pattern of communication (closer) while the high numbers represent a less favorable communicative pattern (more distant) (Table 2).
The relative frequency scores of mother-child and father-child dyads are first presented in the dyadic context and then in the triadic context.
38 Table 2 Grading scores for each nonverbal communication category
DISTANCE
1 2 3 4
less than 10 cm between the social partners between 10 cm and 1 m between 1 to 2 m more than 2 m
VISUAL ORIENTATION
1 2 3 4
the social partners look at each other the social partners look in the same direction unilateral, child looks at parent or parent looks at child or object close to the child the social partners look in different directions
BODY ORIENTATION
1 2 3 4
the social partners face each other the social partners face the same direction unilateral, child faces parent or parent faces child the social partners face different directions
DYADIC INVOLVEMENT
1 2 3 4
joint activity (involving manipulation of the same object) joint attention (involving attention to the same object but with no manipulation) unilateral behavior (gesture or talk), initiated by the child towards the parent or initiated by the parent towards the child no involvement
39 3.1.2. Relative frequency scores
Dyadic context
Distance. Figure 1 shows the frequency distribution of the distance variables. An inspection of this figure reveals that, in the dyadic context, mothers and children as well as fathers and children maintained almost the same physical proximity to each other in the course of the social interaction. They were most often observed playing at a distance of 10 cm to 1 m from each other (54.03 % for mother-child dyads and 50.92 % for fatherchild dyads). They were also often observed at a distance of 1 to 2 m (25.75% for motherchild dyads and 27.55% for father-child dyads). Less often were they seen in very close physical proximity (15.25 % for mother-child dyads and 16.42 % for father-child dyads), or at a distance larger than 2 m (4.62 % for mother-child dyads and 3.98 % for fatherchild dyads).
Figure 1 Frequency distribution of the distance variables
60
40 30 mother-child father-child
20 10
10
m
Relative frequency
50
40 Visual orientation.
The frequency distribution of the visual orientation variables is
presented in Figure 2. As can be seen, mother-child dyads and father-child dyads present very similar patterns of visual orientation. They were very often observed looking at the same object at the same time (58.26 % for mother-child dyads and 54.27 % for fatherchild dyads). The parents were also observed looking at their child while the child was looking elsewhere in 16% of the coding intervals. On the other hand, the children were rarely seen looking at their parent while their parent was looking elsewhere (2.04% for mother-child dyads and 1.99% for father-child dyads). Eye-to-eye contacts were also rare (3.64% for mother-child dyads and 3.30% for father-child dyads). Finally, the parents and their child were observed having no visual contact at all around 16% of the coding time (15.88% for mother-child dyads and 18.46% for father-child dyads).
Figure 2 Frequency distribution of the visual orientation variables
50 40 30 20
mother-child father-child
10
ire c
tio
ns
io n nt d
di ffe
re
e sa m
tl oo
ki n
g
di
at
re ct
ch ild
ar at p
lo ch ild
pa re n
ok in g
ce
to
fa
en t
ce
0
fa
Relative frequency
60
41 Body orientation. As can be seen in Figure 3, mother-child dyads and father-child dyads also present very similar patterns of body orientation. Mother-child dyads and father-child dyads were very often observed with their bodies oriented towards the same object (56.70% for mother-child dyads and 52.91% for father-child dyads). The parents were also observed positioning their body towards their child while their child was turning elsewhere for 18.85% (mother-child dyads) and 16.95% (father-child dyads) of the coding intervals. The children were rarely seen turning their body towards their parent while the parent was turning his/her body elsewhere (1.51 % for mother-child and father-child dyads). Finally, mother-child dyads and father-child dyads spent, practically, the same amount of time in face to face interactions (10.35 % for mother-child dyads and 12.58 % for father-child dyads) and without any kind of body orientation towards each other (10.69 % for mother-child dyads and 12.53 % for father-child dyads).
Figure 3 Frequency distribution of the body orientation variables
60
40 30 mother-child
20
father-child
10
io n di re ct
ffe re nt
di re di
e sa m
s
n ct io
ld ch i g fa ci n
pa re nt
ch i
ld
fa ci
ng
to
fa
pa re n
ce
t
0 fa ce
Relative frequency
50
42 Dyadic involvement. The frequency distribution of the dyadic involvement variables is presented in Figure 4. Mother-child dyads and father-child dyads were observed very often in joint activities (78.42 % for mother-child dyads and 69.38 % for father-child dyads). Both dyads were also observed in some instances of joint attention (10.06 for mother-child dyads and 15.60 for father-child dyads), and of attempts by the parents to engage their child in a joint activity (3.16 for mother-child dyads and 9.57 for father-child dyads). Attempts initiated by the child were quite rare (1.55 % for mother-child dyads and .97 % for father-child dyads). Finally, the dyads were rarely observed without any kind of dyadic involvement (6.17 % for mother-child dyads and 2.48 % for father-child dyads).
Figure 4
80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 jo un in ta ila te ct ra iv ity l, ch un ild il a in te iti ra at l, ed pa re nt in iti at ed jo in ta tte nt io no n in vo lv em en t
Relative frequency
Frequency distribution of the dyadic involvement variables
mother-child father-child
43 Triadic context
Distance. An inspection of Figure 5 reveals, clearly, that mothers and children maintain a closer proximity to each other than fathers and children in the triadic context. While mothers and children played more frequently at a distance between 10 cm and 1 m (45.51 %), fathers and children played more frequently at a wider distance from each other, between 1 and 2 m (40.70 %). Similarly, while mother-child dyads were observed very close to each other, at a distance of less than 10 cm, for 11.35% of the coding time, father-child dyads were observed only 5 % of the coding time in this more intimate contact. Inversely, while father-child dyads were observed 25.83 % of the coding time very distant from each other (more than 2 meters), mothers and children were observed less frequently so far away from each other (16.95 %).
Figure 5 Frequency distribution of the distance variables
45 40 30 25 20
mother-child father-child
15 10 5
10
m
Relative frequency
35
44 Visual orientation. As can be seen in Figure 6, mother-child dyads were very often observed looking at the same object (40.66 %). Mothers were also often seen looking at their child while their child was looking elsewhere (27.55 %). Mother-child dyads were also found to have no visual contact at all for 19.77% of the coding intervals. Finally, the mothers and their child were rarely observed looking at each other (2.45 %), and the children were observed very rarely looking at their mother while she was looking elsewhere (1.64 %). Father-child dyads show relatively different visual orientation patterns. They were most often observed with no visual contact at all (37.16 %) and were both observed looking at the same object for only 24.96% of the coding intervals. Similarly to mother-child dyads, fathers were observed looking at their child while their child was looking elsewhere for 27.25% of the coding intervals. Finally, father-child dyads were very rarely observed looking at each other (1.29 %), or with the child looking at his/her father while the father was looking elsewhere (.86 %).
Figure 6
45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0
mother-child
di re ct io ns
ct io n
en t
di re di ffe r
sa m e
at
ch ild
en t lo ok in g
at pa r
pa re nt
lo ok in g
to
fa ce
father-child
ch ild
fa ce
Relative frequency
Frequency distribution of the visual orientation variables
45 Body orientation. Mothers and their child were observed 57.66 % of the coding time with their body oriented towards the same object in the triadic context whereas fathers and their child were observed 49.26 % of the coding time in the same position. Mother-child dyads were also less often found turning away from each other than father-child dyads (8.83 % vs. 21.50%). For both dyads, the children were rarely seen oriented towards their parent while the parent was oriented elsewhere (1.45 % for mother-child dyads and .91 % for father-child dyads). Finally, mother-child dyads were observed 5.76 % of the coding time in face to face interaction while father-child dyads were observed 3.97 % of the coding time showing the same pattern of body orientation.
Figure 7 Frequency distribution of the body orientation variables
60
40 30 mother-child
20
father-child
10
io n di re ct
ffe re nt
di re di
e sa m
s
n ct io
ld ch i g ci n fa
pa re nt
fa ci ng ld ch i
ce
to
fa
pa re n
ce
t
0
fa
Relative frequency
50
46 Dyadic involvement. Mother-child dyads were most often observed in joint activities (53.44 %) and in joint attention situations (21.22%). They were also found with no involvement at all for 12.32 % of the coding time. Activities involving the initiative of only one of the partners towards the other were rare (2.37 % for children as initiator and 6.14 % for mothers). The dyadic involvement patterns observed in father-child dyads are somewhat different, especially for two of them. Father-child dyads were observed 30.98% of the coding time in joint activities and 30.40% of the coding time with no involvement at all.
Figure 8 Frequency distribution of the dyadic involvement variables
60
40 30 20
mother-child
10
father-child
tio n in vo lv em en t no
at te n
jo in t
in iti at ed
ar en t
in iti at ed al ,p
un ila te r
al ,c hi ld
jo in t
ac tiv ity
0
un ila te r
Relative frequency
50
47 3.1.3. Mean scores
To further compare the communicative patterns observed in mother-child and father-child dyads, the mean scores of each category of dyadic patterns were analyzed using a two-way repeated measures ANOVA (parent x context). The means, standard deviations, and the results of the ANOVAs are presented in Table 3. Note that preliminary analyses were performed with sex of the child as a between-subject factor for each category. No significant main effect for sex nor interaction with sex were found. In addition correlational analyses were conducted on the communicative variables in each context for mother-child and father-child dyads. Because the correlational patterns between the variables were found to vary according to the context (dyad and triad), and to the parent, distinct analyses were performed for each of the communication variables.
As can be seen in Table 3, the analyses yielded a significant main effect for context for all of the four categories and a significant main effect for parent for three out of the four categories. A significant context x parent interaction was also found for each of the four categories. Overall, these findings indicate that mother-child dyads differed significantly from father-child dyads, especially in the triadic context. Also the patterns of communication of both mother-child and father-child dyads changed significantly from one context to the other.
48
Insert Table 3
49 More specifically, in the dyadic situation, mother-child dyads play relatively close to each other, show a close communicative pattern both in relation to their visual and body orientation, and maintain a positive type of communicative involvement. A similar communicative pattern emerges during father-child play interaction in the dyadic context. In fact, univariate analyses of variance indicate no significant differences between mother-child dyads and father-child dyads within the dyadic context.
Different communicative patterns are evident when the child, the mother, and the father are observed interacting together. In comparison to the dyadic context, mothers and children, in the triadic context, play at a larger distance from each other (F (1,41) = 4.35, p
