This paper explores important conceptual issues that confront researchers who wish to study the role of empathy in parent-child interaction. Part I reviews the major existing theories of parent empathy offered by the psychoanalytic-object relations and the client-centered schools of thought. In part II, a new processing model derived from the…

This longitudinal study of 10 infants in a day care nursery traces the development of recognition and attachment to a primary caregiver from approximately 3 1/2 months of age (shortly after enrollment in the program) through the end of the first year. Monthly assessments of about 10 minutes each, on two successive days, were made of the infant's…

This study investigated the theoretical concept of attachments to parents as having pervasive influence on psychological adaptation into young adulthood. Specifically, traditional-age college students' perceptions of separate attachments to their mothers and fathers were related to students' elf-reported explanatory style and empathy. Using a…

This study investigated whether behavioral inhibition is best conceptualized as a continuous variable or as a distinct typology with two or more subcategories. The following data were gathered on 58 infants at 5, 7, 10, and 13 months of age; physiological functioning (cardiovascular activity and salivary cortisol); emotional expressivity in…

The paper examines the meaning of transitional objects and attachment to significant others in 18 severely retarded children (mean age 5.2 years). Five case studies illustrate that the use of objects and attachments can be seen as a normal phenomenon and that often the children are responding appropriately to emotional events with behaviors near…

This paper seeks to integrate some ideas from family systems theory and attachment theory within a theory of public opinion and social movement. Citing the classic "The Authoritarian Personality," the paper states that the first authorities children know, their parents or other caregivers, shape children's attitudes toward all…

This study assessed the associations of maternal attachment classification with mother and daughter depression and affect regulation, with the hypothesis that affect regulation might mediate between attachment and depression both within and between generations. Twenty-five dysthymic mothers, 25 non-depressed mothers, and their adolescent…

Despite recent widespread claims about the importance of early contact for facilitating mother-infant bonding, the effects of early contact have not been convincingly demonstrated. Methodological and procedural difficulties, contributing to a "Hawthorne" effect, may account for the pattern of inconsistent and unclear findings to date.…

Data from the longitudinal Berkeley Becoming a Family Project were used to evaluate the possibility that husbands' and wives' working models of attachment are related to the quality of their marital relationship. The main issue investigated was that of whether there are connections between working models of childhood attachment relationships and…

This study investigated the effects of availability of a familiar human attachment object (the mother) and familiar inanimate attachment object (the child's blanket) on a child's emotionality and learning of a discrimination task. A total of 64, 2- and 3-year-old children were assigned to groups (nonattached, mother-attached, or blanket-attached),…

The paper reviews aspects of a young child's emotional development occurring in social interactions and discusses implications for children having, or at risk of having, emotional and behavioral problems. Contributions of ethology and ecology are cited in an examination of the child's interaction with the family. Research findings are reviewed on…

The interactive creation of an attachment bond of affective communication between the psychobiologically attuned primary caregiver and the infant is central to human emotional development. These emotional transactions directly influence the experience-dependent maturation of the infant's early developing right hemisphere, which is in a growth…

To determine whether the daily mother-infant separation involved in day care adversely affects children's emotional development, follow-up data on emotional development were compared for preschool children in day care and their home-reared counterparts. Follow-up assessments were done in the home at approximately age 3-1/2 for ten white middle…

Noting that gender may be an important issue when studying relations between attachment and social functioning, four studies explored whether the relationship between children's internal working models of attachment and their general functioning was gender specific. A total of 246 children, ages 5 to 10 years, were given the Separation Anxiety…

The importance of family to identity is an accepted tenet of identity theories, though there is some dispute about the nature of this parental relationship and its facilitation of identity formation. This study investigated the relationship between the two developmental constructs of identity and attachment. Using the Identity Status Paradigm,…