attachment theory and child abuse

7/23/2019 Attachment Theory and Child Abuse

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Revised 9 November 2012

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Attachment Theory and Child Abuse

Alan Challoner MA (Phil) MChS

ABSTRACT

Child abuse is seen to follow a general pattern and it is the intrusion of fear into

what might otherwise be good enough care-giving that is necessary for the

development of a disorganised or disoriented attachment. Research has shown

that in the case of the rejected infant only one signal is required to throw the child

into conflict. Withdrawal tendencies occur as a result of main carers threat. Thispaper seeks to find some reasons for the perpetuation of abuse through the

generations, and draws attention to the potential remedies.

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In recent years research has shown that the revealed characteristics of abusing

parents and abused children fit the pattern of attachment disorders. Fontana has

drawn attention to a maltreatment syndrome, in which child abuse is seen to

follow a general pattern. 1 DeLozier describes this pattern of dependent, fearful,

anxious, hostile, and depressed behaviour consistently found in abusing families, as

well as parent-child rle reversal and the generational pattern of abuse, asreflecting dysfunctional attachment and care-taking behavioural systems in these

families. 2

She describes the literature as reflecting varying degrees of anxious attachment

and detachment resulting from actual or persistently threatened disruption of

attachments. The intense separation anxiety, dysfunctional anger, distrust of others

and the environment, and restraints on the development of self-reliant behaviour

that are known to accompany attachment disorders are reflected in the

consistent description of abusing parents and children as dependent, depressed,

angry, anxious, isolated, hyper-alert, and distrustful.

Main and Hesse 3 have suggested that it is the intrusion of fear into what mightotherwise be good enough care-giving that is necessary for the development of a

disorganised or disoriented attachment. Fear is obviously a common experience

for physically and emotionally abused children. They suggest it is also probable

1 Fontana, V. J. The maltreated child: The maltreatment syndrome in children. Springfield, Ill.:

Charles C. Thomas. 1971

2 Delozier. P.An application of attachment theory to the study of child abuse. [Ph.D.

dissertation], California School of Professional Psychology; 1979

3

Main, M.; & Hesse, E. Parents Unresolved Traumatic Experiences are Related to InfantDisorganized Attachment Status: Is Frightened and/or Frightening Parental Behaviour the

Linking Mechanism? In Greenberg, M.T.; Cicchetti, D.; & Cummings, M.[Eds.]Attachment in

the Preschool Years: Theory, Research & Intervention. Univ. Chicago Press, 1990.


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that there are frightening aspects of emotional and physical neglect. As Main and

Hesse have described, the concurrent activation of the fear or wariness and

attachment behavioural systems produce strong conflicting motivations when

approaching the care-givers for comfort and they may feel the need to retreat

from them to safety. Proximity seeking mixed with avoidance causes frustration

and stress and if the approach tendencies equal the avoidance tendencies theywill inhibit one another.

Ainsworth has indicated that in the case of the rejected infant only one signal is

required to throw the child into conflict. Withdrawal tendencies occur as a result

of mothers threat signals and these lead directly to approach tendencies. The

connection between these opposing tendencies is internal to the attached infant

and has no reference to the circumstances. As the approach is forbidden, the

attachment behaviour system is still further activated but approach remains

forbidden. Thus there is conflict as vacillation between approach, avoidance and

angry behaviour occurs. The only solution is a shift of attention toward another

figure. 4 (Ainsworth, Idem, 1982)

A psychoanalytic view has been expressed by Fine when he writes:

For optimal child-rearing, what seems to count more than anything else is the

maturity and emotional health of the parent, and these depend on the inner

structure of the family. 5

Petrovich and Gewirtz propose that exposure to biologically inappropriate stimuli

during social development may functionally isolate such an individual from a

reproductive population. Infanticide and serious infant abuse are likely to be

observed under stressful conditions of intensified reproductive pressure,

environmental ecological depletion, and/or where the mothers mate is not the

infants biological father.

In some species, the striking features of distorted imprinting and attachment

processes provide a provocative demonstration of sexuality channelled in the

direction of the biologically inappropriate object. Forced separation from objects

of attachment has deleterious effects on avian and mammalian infant behaviour.

If separation is prolonged or leads to privation and deprivation, the consequences

may be even more severe. In monkeys and chimpanzees, isolation studies have

shown that appropriate early social experiences are essential for the normal

development of sexual activity. In turn, prolonged separation and deprivation

may progressively lead to depression and related withdrawal from social

interactions. Human data on the development of sexuality and gender identity,

suggest also that sexual phenotypes, as genetically programmed at the momentof conception, may be radically modified and altered by environmental stimuli,

such as chemical by-products of other genes, hormones, or exposure during

development to biologically and psychologically inappropriate stimuli. ( Fine,

idem)

Cicchetti & Barnett 6 and Schneider-Rosen et al., 7 have shown from their research

that children at any age up to four years, who have been ill-treated by parents,

4 Ainsworth, Mary D Salter. Attachment: Retrospect and Prospect. In Parkes, Colin Murray; &

Stevenson-Hinde, Joan. [Eds.] The Place of Attachment in Human Behaviour. Basic Books,New York USA. 1982.

5 Fine, R. A History of Psychoanalysis. New York, USA, Columbia Univ. Press; 1979.


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are significantly more likely to show insecure patterns of attachment. Even those

children who might be securely attached in their early months are likely to lose that

at later assessments if they are ill-treated.

A similar line of enquiry was pursued by Youngblade and Belsky, when they

examined the link between the aetiology of child ill-treatment and later

development together with the attachment outcome. 8 As others have done,

they also found a strong association between ill-treatment of the child and

attachment insecurity. Another factor uncovered was the aberrant inter-peer

relationship of those who had been ill-treated. They emphasised the link between

abuse in childhood and later transgenerational abuse of their own children. The

investigation highlighted the urgency of intervention measures at a family level.

Several authors have reported comparable findings and Browne and Saqi

expanded their conclusions to incorporate a suggestion that abused children were

more likely to show increased stranger anxiety and reduced exploratory

behaviour. 9 Extending this work into separate domains, Aber & Allen 10, used three

cohorts of children aged from four to eight years. These were divided as to: ill-treated children (93), demographically matched non-ill-treated children from families receiving

welfare benefits (67),

non-ill-treated children from middle-class families (30).The three domains were:

relationships with novel adults, effectance motivation, and cognitive maturity.Assessments were made on ten dependent variables, and factorially analysed.

Two meaningful factors emerged:

on a factor measuring secure readiness to learn in the company of noveladults; ill-treated children scored lower than welfare children, who in turn

scored less than middle-class children;

6

Cicchetti, D.; & Barnett, D. Attachment organization in maltreated pre-schoolers. SpecialIssue: Attachment and developmental psychopathology. Develop. & Psychopath. 3(4);

[pp., 397-411]; 1991.

7 Schneider-Rosen, K.; Braunwald, K.G.; Carlson, V.; & Cicchetti, D. Current perspectives in

attachment theory: Illustration from the study of maltreated infants. Monographs of the

Society for Research in Child Development; 50(1-2); [pp., 194-210]; 1985.

8 Youngblade, L.M.; & Belsky, J. Child maltreatment, infant-parent attachment security, and

dysfunctional peer relationships in toddlerhood. Topics in Early Childhood Special Education;

9(2);[pp., 1-15]; 1989.

9 Browne, K.; & Saqi, S. Mother-infant interaction and attachment in physically abusing families.

Special Issue: Early child maltreatment. Jnl. Reprod. & Inf. Psychol.; 6(3); [pp., 163-182]; 1988.

10 Aber, J L.; & Allen, J.P. Effects of maltreatment on young childrens socio-emotional

development: An attachment theory perspective. Devlop. Psychol.; 23(3); 1987.


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on a factor measuring outer-directedness; ill-treated children and welfarechildren scored higher than middle-class children, but did not differ significantly

from each other.

From this it was suggested that maltreatment, occurring during early childhood,

disrupts the dynamic balance between the motivation to establish safe, secure

relationships with adults and the motivation to venture out to explore the world in a

competent fashion.

Theoretically the development of such attachment pathology (anxious

attachment and detachment) in a childs attachment system could later become

incorporated into the adult attachment and care-taker systems and would thus

affect both the development of parental behaviour and the development of

attachment in the next generation. Thus the transmission of abusive parent-child

interaction could be seen as resulting, to a great extent, from patterns of

attachment dysfunction that are perpetuated within the family.

DeLozier (1979) reports the results of a research project in which a group of

abusing mothers were compared to a comparable group of non-abusing mothers.There was a clear pattern of severe attachment disorders in the group of eighteen

abusing mothers as compared with another group of eighteen typical mothers.

The difficulties appeared to originate from threatened disruption of attachments,

as well as severe discipline in early childhood; to have been influential in the

childbirth experience of the mothers; and to be manifested at the time of the

project, both in their general expectations of significant others and in their pattern

of response, to projected separation from attachment figures.

In her summary DeLozier interpreted the analysis of the data collected in her study

as indicating that in childhood the abusing mothers experienced severe threats of

abandonment and harm. The childrens self-expectations and possibly parentalexpectations were that they should care for their parents and this added to a

general uncertainty as to the availability of significant others.

Their histories contain some indicators of childhood disruptive events such as family

problems causing a parent to leave home, though not permanently. During

childhood the abusing mothers appear to have had to watch constantly for

indications of impending separation and other threats to care-taking. In

adulthood there is evidence that they viewed significant others as being generally

inaccessible. They appeared not to have developed adequate internal

representations of attachment figures and other significant individuals as reliable

and accessible. Furthermore, the abusing mothers indicated that, at the time of

the birth of the later-abused child, they were generally fearful, felt alone andunsafe, and were dissatisfied with the availability of significant others. Thus it

appears likely that the abusing mothers were handicapped by their own

attachment difficulties in their initial steps toward maternal care-taking.

She believed that all of the results were consistent with the present manifestations

of attachment difficulties as assessed by the Separation Anxiety Test. On this test

the abusing mothers indicated a high current level of attachment disorder,

primarily anxious attachment, but with some tendency toward detachment as

well. Thus the abusing mothers in the study demonstrated their overall sensitivity to

separation, especially mild separation, and their feelings of helplessness anxiety,

and anger in response to significant separation experiences.DeLozier suggest that these findings support the prediction that the abusing

mothers in the study have experienced difficulty in their childhood attachments


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and in the development of internal representations of significant others as

accessible and reliable, resulting in consequent adult attachment difficulties as

well as in possible difficulties in the development of appropriate care-taking

behaviour.

There are implications that DeLozier perceives from her research and she

summarises them as follows:

The pattern of attachment dysfunction found in the abusing mothers in this research

suggests the attachment-related origin of at least some of the inappropriate

parenting directed toward their children. The dysfunctional development of anger

and anxiety are two components of anxious attachment, especially if the expression

of anger has been prohibited by the childs fear of precipitating loss of care-taking.

Once anxious attachment has developed, separation signals can trigger expression

of intense anxiety and anger. It seems possible that abusing mothers, who exhibit a

high degree of sensitivity to separation from significant others, interpret the normal

behaviour of their children as if it were actual or threatened rejection. If so, these

mothers would be likely to respond to such a misapprehension with dysfunctional

levels of anxiety and anger and with feelings of rejection, self-blame, andhelplessness. Not only could the childs normal exploratory behaviour elicit such a

response, but even such behaviour as normal crying could function as a danger

signal to the anxiously attached mother. Thus the attachment-related response of

the mother may result in the inappropriate direction of anxiety and anger toward

the child who, owing to the expectations that the mother maintains regarding

attachment figures that they will be inaccessible and unreliable.

Furthermore, the development of competence in a child depends not only on the

parents appropriate response to his attachment behaviour, but also on

encouragement of the childs increasing self-reliance. If the parent, however,

responds to normal parent-child separation with intense levels of anxiety or anger,

increased attachment need, decreased self-reliance, and feelings of rejection, the

parent will be more than likely to discourage the childs exploratory and self-reliantbehaviour, especially in inverted parent-child relationships, thereby even further

hampering the childs development. (Idem, 1979)

In a later study, Crittenden assessed what the differences were between ill-treated

and adequately reared infants, whether they existed at birth, and if the differences

could be positively changed. She devised two experiments:

EXPERIMENT 1 Thirty-eight low socio-economic scale infants, aged from one to 19

months, were assessed in terms of:

congenital abnormalities,

mother-child interactions, developmental delay.The thirty-eight mothers of these infants, aged 15 to 49 years, were classified as:

abusing (8), neglecting (10), problematic (10), adequate (10).EXPERIMENT 2 Seventy-three low socio-economic scale infants, aged from two to 24months, were similarly assessed, but in addition their pattern of attachment to their

mother was also assessed, as was a change in their pattern of interaction when the


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sensitivity of a second adult was experimentally manipulated. Their mothers, aged

13 to 35 years, were classified as:

abusing (17), neglecting (21), problematic (22), adequate (13)The results gave evidence that:

the mother initiates the maltreatment but both mother and infant behavethereafter to maintain the situation;

the ill-treated subjects did not differ from adequately reared subjects incongenital characteristics;

however the ill-treated subjects displayed some differences in characteristicsthat could have been affected by environmental conditions;

the abused subjects were difficult, mildly delayed, and angry when stressed; the neglected subjects tended to be passive, significantly delayed, and

somewhat helpless when stressed.

When intervention procedures were introduced with the mothers, il l-treated

subjects showed developmental gains and began to behave more co-operatively

in their interactions. 11

It is important to understand how abused children react when they are placed into

the care of alternative adults following abuse at home. Howes & Segal

investigated this situation with 16 children who had been removed from their

homes owing to abuse and, or, neglect. It was found that the children were just aslikely to form insecure and particularly insecure-avoidant, attachment relations

with the alternative care-givers as might be expected had they remained at

home. The subjects did vary in their attachment behaviour depending upon the

particular care-giver, and the attachment classifications were inconcordant. This

approximated to a division between the more sensitive and less-detached care-

givers on morning sessions, than with the lesser motivated afternoon care-givers.

The highest secure scores on attachment was directly related to the longest

placement with the more sensitive care-givers. 12

In conclusion, an attachment theory view of child abuse calls for the early

detection of attachment disorders in both parent and child, assessment of theextent of attachment dysfunction in high-risk families, and intervention with abusive

families to reduce separation anxiety and support the more adequate

development of attachment bonds. In this regard, for example, the common

practice of removal of the child from the home warrants careful inspection.

Although sometimes mandatory for the childs protection, such an intervention

further strains the poorly developed attachment relationships within the family and

11 Crittenden, P.M. Maltreated infants: Vulnerability and resilience. Jnl. Child Psychol. & Psychiat.

& Allied Discp.; 26(1); [pp., 85-96]; 1985.

12 Howes, C.; & Segal, J. Childrens relationships with alternative care-givers: The special case of

maltreated children removed from their homes. Jnl. Appl. Develop. Psychol.; 14(1); [pp., 71-

81]; 1993.


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further adversely affects the development of attachment and self-reliance in the

child. Moreover, if the child is to be returned home eventually,separation in and

of itselfwill serve to activate attachment behaviours upon reunion that further

stress parent-child relations, possibly eliciting further abuse.

Crittendens work that suggests that some ill-treated infants actively contribute to

their own misery needs careful consideration and checking. If this outcome is

comprehensively established then it has relevance in adult situations. In particular

it might be asked whether spouse abuse is a continuation of this effect , albeit in

another attachment relationship.

From the attachment theory perspective, therefore, efforts should be made to:

direct child-abuse treatment to the family unit where possible, with the childeither remaining in the home under close supervision or with frequent,

prolonged contact between parent and child during separation;

provide interventions in abusive and potentially abusive families that supportthe development of attachment bonds in children and remedy attachmentdysfunctions in both children and adults; and

direct attention toward the provision of support to all parents in their rle ascare-givers, thus enabling them to provide more reliable and accessible care-

giving to their children.

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educational purposes only (not for profit beyond the cost of reproduction)

provided that the author receives acknowledgement and this notice is included:

Reprinted with permission from:

For Want of a Better Good

Author: Alan Challoner MA (Phil) MChS

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attachment theory and child abuse

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