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Attachment & Human Development

ISSN: 1461-6734 (Print) 1469-2988 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rahd20

Dyadic interactions as precursors to attachmentsecurity: implications for intervention andresearch

Susan S. Woodhouse

To cite this article: Susan S. Woodhouse (2010) Dyadic interactions as precursors toattachment security: implications for intervention and research, Attachment & HumanDevelopment, 12:1-2, 151-157, DOI: 10.1080/14616730903381514

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14616730903381514

Published online: 03 Mar 2010.

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COMMENTARY

Dyadic interactions as precursors to attachment security: implications

for intervention and research

Susan S. Woodhouse*

Department of Counselor Education, Counseling Psychology, and Rehabilitation Services,Pennsylvania State University, PA, USA

(Received 3 March 2009; final version received 20 September 2009)

This commentary focuses on the important contributions of the Beebe et al.(present issue) study to understanding precursors to attachment, including theaddition of a particular focus on infant contributions to the dyadic interactionsrelated to attachment outcomes, as well as a better understanding of theprecursors specific to insecure-ambivalent attachment and attachment disorgani-zation. In addition, limitations of the time series methodology for interpreting themeaning of maternal interactive contingency findings from an attachmentperspective are discussed. Finally, implications of the present study for bothclinical work and research are highlighted throughout.

Keywords: attachment; attachment precursors; infant behaviour; insecure/ambivalent attachment; disorganized attachment; maternal contingency

Beebe et al. (2010, p. 3–141, current issue) present a very exciting and innovativestudy that has a number of important implications for understanding the precursorsto attachment. Beebe et al. provide a creative and powerful micro-analytic approachto questions about the link between maternal sensitive responding and infantattachment. A better understanding of the precursors to attachment would allow usto design more targeted, effective interventions that focus on the most salient aspectsof mother–infant interactions related to later attachment outcomes. Effectiveattachment interventions are important given the wide variety of negativeconsequences associated with insecurity of attachment (for reviews see DeKlyen &Greenberg, 2008; Kobak, Cassidy, Lyons-Ruth, & Ziv, 2006).

One of the central ideas of attachment theory is that a mother’s sensitivelyresponsive behavior is a key contributor to the quality of the infant’s attachment toher (Ainsworth, 1982; Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978), and meta-analyticfindings provide empirical support for this link (De Wolff & van IJzendoorn, 1997).The effect size of the relation between maternal sensitivity and infant attachment,however, is not large. Specifically, the De Wolff and van IJzendoorn (1997) meta-analysis found effect sizes for the link between parental behavior and infantattachment that varied between .17 and .24, depending on how sensitivity andattachment were measured. Thus, although Ainsworth’s fundamental proposition

*Email: ssw10@psu.edu

Attachment & Human Development

Vol. 12, Nos. 1–2, January–March 2010, 151–157

ISSN 1461-6734 print/ISSN 1469-2988 online

� 2010 Taylor & Francis

DOI: 10.1080/14616730903381514

http://www.informaworld.com

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linking maternal sensitivity with infant attachment has been supported, the vexingquestion remains: Why is the link between parental responsiveness and infantattachment outcomes not as high as theoretically expected?

The importance of including infant behavior

The results of the study by Beebe et al. have important implications for improvingmeasurement of maternal responsiveness and for expanding understanding of thecrucial variables that should be considered when examining maternal responsiveness.Moreover, and perhaps most importantly, Beebe et al. provide compelling evidencethat perhaps we should more carefully examine the meaning of infant behaviors inmother–infant dyadic interactions if we would like to understand the origins ofinfant attachment. Although Ainsworth, Bell, and Stayton (1971) consideredmaternal behaviors within the context of infant cues that give the maternalbehaviors their meaning, the Beebe et al. study actually statistically examines thelinks between attachment outcomes and two ways of looking at infant behavior (i.e.,examination of the ways that infant behavior is contingent on mother behavior andthe ways in which infant behavior is consistent with previous infant behavior), inaddition to examining how maternal behaviors relate to later infant attachment. Thisrepresents an important shift because the focus is not simply on the mother asresponding to infant cues, but rather on the mother and infant as they respond toone another in the dyadic interaction and the degree to which each individual’sbehavior can be predicted on the basis of (a) the other’s behavior and (b) his or herown behavior. Time series analysis allows one to see how much of the mother’sbehavior is predicted by the baby’s behavior and how much is predicted by thestability of the mother’s own behavior. Likewise, it permits one to examine thedegree to which the baby’s behavior is predicted by the mother’s behavior andthe degree to which it is predicted by the stability of the baby’s own behavior. Thismethod partitions out the amount of variance that is due to each of these sources.This novel approach allows an examination of dyadic patterns of responding asprecursors to attachment instead of simply thinking about the mother’s behavior (inthe context of infant cues), as is typically done. This is an advance in how we canlook at precursors to attachment that provides new information about how mothersand infants interact, and what infants might be learning from these interactions thatare linked to later attachment.

Throughout the monograph Beebe et al. present findings on two different kindsof analyses: an extreme behaviors analysis and a contingency analysis. This dualapproach was extremely helpful because contingency analyses alone would bedifficult to interpret without examination of extreme behaviors. The reason for this isthat because contingencies (i.e., instances of consistency in one’s own behavior or inthe predictability of behavior between mother and infant) are in and of themselvesneutral. Contingent responding here is not defined as responding that appropriatelymatches what the infant needs, but rather is defined in the very technical sense ofbeing predictable. Thus, we need some way of making sense of whether particulartypes of contingency (i.e., predictability) are good or bad. It is easy to imagine thatsome forms of contingency could be positive (e.g., baby smiles, mother smiles)whereas other forms could be detrimental (e.g., mother consistently looks awayregardless of infant behavior; very predictable, but not helpful to the baby). Thus, weneed some way to try to make sense of the contingencies that are by definition

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neutral. One important strength of the study was that the authors examinedcontingencies in the context of rare/extreme behaviors, which aided in theinterpretation the meaning of the contingencies.

Understanding precursors to insecure/ambivalent attachment

Two of the most exciting contributions of the Beebe et al. study included theopportunity to better understand precursors of insecure/ambivalent attachment anddisorganized attachment. Infants classified as insecure/ambivalent (C) are the leastunderstood infant attachment group (Cassidy & Berlin, 1994). Moreover, as Cassidyand Berlin noted, this is a difficult group to study because samples typically containfew insecure/ambivalent infants. In fact, the field has advanced relatively little in itsunderstanding of insecure/ambivalent attachment since the 1994 review of theliterature by Cassidy and Berlin. As Beebe et al. note, most samples include morebabies classified as insecure/avoidant (A) than babies classified as insecure/ambivalent (C); thus the Beebe et al. study presented a unique opportunity to learnmore about the precursors to insecure/ambivalent attachment.

Some of the results regarding future C infants were perhaps surprising. First,consider the results from the extreme behaviors analysis. There were few measurabledifferences between dyads involving future secure (B) and future ambivalent (C)infants on most behaviors. Only one extreme behavior was significantly differentbetween future B and future C dyads: dyadic ‘‘chase and dodge,’’ with future Cdyads exhibiting the chase and dodge pattern twice as frequently as the future Bdyads. Perhaps one particularly surprising finding showed there was no differencebetween future B and future C dyads on mother interruptive touch. These resultssuggested that mother interruptive touch may not be as important a precursor to Cas previously thought (e.g., Cassidy & Berlin, 1994). Similarly, excessive use ofintrusive touch was not significantly different between future B and future C dyads(although there appeared to be a nonsignificant trend). These results mirrorqualitative results of a study by Cassidy, Woodhouse, Cooper, Hoffman, Powell, andRodenberg (2005), who found that maternal intrusion/interruption during play wassurprisingly common, at least in a diverse, low-income sample, and that intrusion/interruption during play did not seem to predict attachment insecurity. Rather,Cassidy et al. found that only mothers who intruded in ways that activated theattachment system or communicated a discomfort with allowing the baby to go outand explore apart from her later had infants who were insecurely attached. In otherwords, infants seemed to be relatively forgiving of intrusion unless the motheractivated the attachment system while the infant was exploring or if the mothermanaged to communicate that she found it intolerable for the baby to focusoutward, rather than on her. The chase and dodge sequence noted by Beebe et al.would appear to fall into this category of intrusions that do not allow the baby tofocus on exploration outside the sphere of the mother. This is an important findingthat helps to shed light on the interpersonal quality of interactions between future Cinfants and their mothers. Further research could focus on naturally-occurringevents similar to the chase and dodge sequence found in the laboratory. It is possiblethat such interactive sequences, like those that activate the infant’s attachmentsystem, should be a clinical focus in mother–infant dyads when they occur. Perhapsmore simple interruption and intrusion could be safely ignored in favor of incidentsthat resemble a chase and dodge pattern. Future research could clarify whether such

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a distinction between simple forms of interruption/intrusion and incidents in whichthe mother appears to communicate discomfort just when the infant is turning awayfrom her would be clinically beneficial.

Results from the contingency analyses likewise showed few differences betweenfuture B and future C dyads across a number of modalities, but the few differencesthat emerged served to further characterize the specific quality of these infants’interactions with their mothers. A pattern emerged that suggests that the future Cinfants closely track an intrusive mother, while at the same time making efforts toignore intrusion. Specifically, future C infants (vs. B) showed lower self-contingency(i.e., predictable, internal patterns of engagement based on their own personalrhythms) but higher engagement coordination with mother engagement (suggestinga vigilant attention to the mother’s patterns of engagement). Thus, future C infantsdo not seem to engage based on their own internal needs, but instead seem to betrying vigilantly to match a mother whose needs seem to take greater precedence inthe dyad than the infant’s. In addition, future C (vs. B) infants showed lowerengagement coordination with maternal touch and lower vocal coordination withmaternal touch, such that future C babies were not matching their responses to theirmother’s (increasingly intrusive touch). Clinicians may find it useful to look at suchpatterns of infant responding. Perhaps future research can track the development ofthese infant behaviors.

Understanding disorganized attachment

As mentioned earlier, a second important contribution was a better understanding ofthe development of disorganization of attachment. Disorganization of attachment iscrucially important because of its links to later psychopathology (see DeKlyen &Greenberg, 2008, for a review). Again, it was notable that there were few differencesbetween future D and future B dyads. This lack of differences was consistent withresearch showing that mothers of future D infants can be as sensitive as mothers offuture B infants (Fonagy, 2001; Lyons-Ruth & Jacobvitz, 2008). Nevertheless, therewere some crucial differences that emerged both in the analyses of extreme behaviorsand the contingency analyses for future D dyads. Most notably, mothers of future Dinfants engaged in extreme behaviors such as excessive time looking away andexcessive looming; moreover, contingency analyses showed that they did so in waysthat involved less predictable (i.e., less self-contingent) patterns of gaze and spatialorientation than did mothers of future B infants. On the other hand, mothers offuture D infants showed higher facial self-contingency, resulting in an overly stable‘‘closed up’’ face. It would be very interesting for future research to try to identifywhat internal or external cues mothers of future D infants may be responding towhen they over-control their faces, look away, or loom. Perhaps research canidentify whether there are particular affectively charged internal or external eventsthat these mothers are trying to regulate through these behaviors. If so, this could beclinically useful. One of the limitations of the Beebe et al. methods is that thesemethods do not allow for the tracking of such triggers or of maternal physiologicalreactions that could help to explain these behaviors. Nevertheless, the results areevocative.

Further, one of the strengths of methodology used by Beebe et al. is that theywere able to examine both maternal behavior and infant behavior, so as to betterunderstand what is happening in future D dyads. For example, future D infants

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spent less time in self-touch (presumably losing the benefits of self-regulationthrough self-touch) and showed greater levels of discrepant affect (positive affect inone modality with simultaneous negative affect in another modality). Future Ddyads showed unique patterns of engagement. Future D infant engagement patternswere less self-contingent (i.e., less based on predictable internal rhythms) than futureB infants in the context of maternal engagement of maternal touch. Overall, thepicture created by the findings is one in which the future D infant is less emotionallyregulated; is less attuned to his or her own inner rhythms; and shows greater degreesof complex, discrepant affect in the context of a mother who is unpredictablyengaging in extreme behaviors such as excessive looking away, excessive looming,and presenting an excessively stable, closed-up face. As noted by Beebe et al., theseresults are quite consistent with previous research on disorganized attachment (e.g.,Lyons-Ruth, Bronfman, & Parsons, 1999; Tomlinson, Cooper, & Murray, 2005). Inaddition, results for future C and future D dyads illustrate the differences betweeninsecure dyad types and highlight the importance of doing research that keeps theinsecure attachment groups separate, rather than collapsed together as insecureversus secure.

Trying to understand maternal interactive contingency

One intriguing result Beebe et al. emphasized was the finding that maternalinteractive contingency was the least predictive of attachment as compared tomother self-contingency, infant self-contingency, and infant interactive contingency.In other words, Beebe et al. found that stability of the infant behaviors (i.e., thedegree to which one can predict the infant’s behavior from the preceding infantbehavior), the stability of mothers’ behaviors (i.e., the degree to which one canpredict the mother’s behavior from the preceding maternal behavior), and the waysin which infants coordinated their behaviors with their mothers told us more aboutfuture attachment than the ways in which mothers coordinated their behaviors withtheir infants. It is difficult to know how to interpret this result from an attachmentperspective. Beebe et al. challenge conventional theory in the literature on mother–infant contingency in face-to-face interaction by arguing that more contingency isnot necessarily better, as Jaffe, Beebe, Feldstein, Crown, and Jasnow (2001) alsopointed out earlier. I think it is important to be very clear that the Beebe et al.challenge makes tremendous logical sense in a context in which contingency isdefined in neutral terms, as it was in their study. It is logical to believe that perfectprediction of mother behavior from infant behavior would not necessarily lead togreater security of attachment. For example, strong maternal contingent respondingcould reflect an extreme form of maternal vigilant over-attending to the infant. Also,given that matching negative maternal behavior with negative infant behavior wouldnot be particularly helpful to the infant, it makes sense that more contingency, asdefined in the Beebe et al. study, should not be better. However, I think that it is veryimportant to note that attachment researchers typically do not define contingency interms of statistical predictability from previous behavior (whether positive ornegative), but rather tend to define contingent responding in terms of appropriateresponding to infant cues. In contrast, contingency in the Beebe et al. study is used ina very specific, neutral way, which should not be confused with appropriate maternalmatching of behavior to the infant’s cues. Thus, from an attachment perspective, thefact that maternal contingency (defined neutrally as any kind of maternal matching

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to the infant, whether positive or negative) is less predictive than other forms ofcontingency is a difficult finding to interpret. It is not clear whether the positive andnegative forms of matching might be canceling each other out, or whether theremight be something else beyond mothers’ moment-by-moment matching to theinfant that is important. For example, Cassidy et al. (2005) present qualitativeevidence supporting the idea of secure base provision as an alternative to maternalsensitivity. They argued that rather than taking the average level of sensitivityobserved, that instead sensitive and insensitive behaviors should be examinedthrough an organizing filter that examines patterns of maternal responding. TheCassidy et al. notion of secure base provision helped to explain their finding thatinfants could be securely attached even when a great deal of insensitive behavior waspresent as long as, in the end, their mothers relented and met the infants’ attachmentneeds. In other words, as long as mothers were comfortable enough with infantexploration and willing to support it, and comfortable enough with attachment bidsand willing to support them, the infant would experience the mother as a secure base,even in the context of a fair bit of maternal insensitivity (as long as certain extremelynegative behaviors were not present, such as frightening behavior). Thus, secure baseprovision is another way of understanding how security of attachment can occur inthe context of either high or low levels of maternal contingent responding, astypically defined in attachment research. However, further research will be needed toelucidate the meaning for attachment theory of the current finding of relatively lowimportance of maternal contingent responding to the infant in the study by Beebeet al. In order to answer the questions raised by the present findings for attachmenttheory we will need new statistical methods that go beyond the time series analysisused by Beebe et al., so as to be able to incorporate more context into micro-analyticresearch.

Nevertheless, the Beebe et al. study represents a significant contribution to theattachment literature. The study provides important insights into salient aspects ofmother–infant interactions that are linked to later attachment. These intriguingfindings are sure to be relevant to clinicians and researchers alike, and will likelystimulate a great deal of research.

References

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Ainsworth, M.D.S., Bell, S.M., & Stayton, D.J. (1971). Individual differences in Strange-Situation behaviour of one-year-olds. In H.R. Schaffer (Ed.), Origins of human socialrelations. Oxford: Academic Press.

Ainsworth, M.D.S., Blehar, M., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: Apsychological study of the Strange Situation. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Beebe, B., Jaffe, J., Markese, S., Buck, K., Chen, H., Cohen, P., et al. (2010). The origins of 12-month attachment: A microanalysis of 4-month mother–infant interaction [Monograph].Attachment & Human Development, 12(1–2), 3–141.

Cassidy, J., & Berlin, L. (1994). The insecure/ambivalent pattern of attachment: Theory andresearch. Child Development, 65, 971–991.

Cassidy, J., Woodhouse, S.S., Cooper, G., Hoffman, K., Powell, B., & Rodenberg, M. (2005).Examination of the precursors of infant attachment security: Implications for earlyintervention and intervention research. In L.J. Berlin, Y. Ziv, L.M. Amaya-Jackson, &M.T. Greenberg (Eds.), Enhancing early attachments: Theory, research, intervention, andpolicy. New York: Guilford Press.

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De Wolff, M.S., & Van IJzendoorn, M.H. (1997). Sensitivity and attachment: A meta-analysison parental antecedents of infant attachment. Child Development, 68, 571–591.

DeKlyen, M., & Greenberg, M.T. (2008). Attachment and psychopathology in childhood. InJ. Cassidy & P. Shaver (Eds.), Handbook of attachment: Theory, research and clinicalapplications (2nd ed., pp. 637–665). New York: Guilford Press.

Fonagy, P. (2001). Attachment theory and psychoanalysis. New York: Other Press.Jaffe, J., Beebe, B., Feldstein, S., Crown, C., & Jasnow, M. (2001). Rhythms of dialogue in

infancy: Coordinated timing in development. Monographs of the Society for Research inChild Development, 66(2, Serial No. 264), 1–131.

Kobak, R., Cassidy, J., Lyons-Ruth, K., & Ziv, Y. (2006). Attachment, stress, andpsychopathology: A developmental pathways model. In D. Cicchetti & D.J. Cohen(Eds.), Developmental psychopathology: Vol. 1. Theory and method (2nd ed., pp. 333–369).Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

Lyons-Ruth, K., Bronfman, E., & Parsons, E. (1999). Maternal disrupted affectivecommunication, maternal frightened or frightening behavior, and disorganized infantattachment strategies. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 64(3,Serial No. 258).

Lyons-Ruth, K., & Jacobvitz, D. (2008). Disorganized attachment: Genetic factors, parentingcontexts, and developmental transformation from infancy to adulthood. In J. Cassidy & P.Shaver (Eds.), Handbook of attachment: Theory, research and clinical applications (2nd ed.,pp. 666–697). New York: Guilford Press.

Tomlinson, M., Cooper, P., & Murray, L. (2005). The mother–infant relationship and infantattachment in a South African peri-urban settlement. Child Development, 76, 1044–1054.

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