A replication and adaptation of Hazan and Schaver's "Love Quiz".

Kate Parkin

A replication and adaptation of Hazan and Schaver’s “Love Quiz”

Introduction

Attachment is a strong bond formed between infant and caregiver. It provides safety and is an asset in terms of the infant’s survival. This bond causes a strong sense of depression when the two individuals are apart and an equal strong sense of elation when they are reunited. Kagan et al (1982) described attachment as “an intense emotional relationship…enduring over time and in which prolonged separation…is accompanied by stress and sorrow” More recently Atkinson et al 2000 describes attachment as “an infant’s tendency to seek closeness to particular people and to feel more secure in their presence”

Most psychologists agree that pleasure on reunion, separation protest (despair when separated), stranger anxiety (fear of strangers) and general orientation (crawling and eye contact) occur because of the formation of attachment, and that most infants go through these stages. The duration and intensity of these feelings however are said to depend on personal differences (Ainsworth 1973; 1978; 1979) (Isabell et al 1989).

In order to test these differences Ainsworth set up an experiment called the strange situation. This process involves a mother bringing a baby into an unfamiliar room where there are lots of toys. The baby is left to play at will as four steps to measure the infant’s attachment begin:

A stranger comes in and attempts to play with the infant. Mother, stranger and infant are present in room.

The mother leaves the baby alone with the stranger. Stranger and infant are present in room.

The mother returns and plays with the child; the stranger leaves. Mother and infant are present in room.

The mother leaves. Only the infant is present in room.

Each case lasts approximately three minutes and observers carefully note how the baby behaves. Based on her findings of this experiment Ainsworth devised three “attachment types”, type A, type B, and type C.

Insecure avoidant attachment: The infant doesn’t react or even seem to notice the mother’s and stranger’s movements.
Secure attachment; the infant protests when the parent leaves, and on her return plays happily.
Insecure avoidant attachment; the infant resists contact with mother but protests when left alone.

Ainsworth argues that these differences are caused by the way the mother treats the infant. Mothers of securely attached infants are sensitive to their child’s needs; whereas mothers of avoidant infants are irritated by them and reject them; mothers of anxious babies, however, are not rejecting but misunderstanding of their infants needs. Isabella et al (1989) supported these theories. However Kagan (1982) suggested that these differences were caused by the infant’s innate temperament, that simply some infants are good at forming attachments and others aren’t.

Belsky and Campell et al (1996) suggest that change; chronic stress or illness occurring in the Primary Care giver may shift the child’s attachment type from secure to insecure. This supports Ainsworth’s theory that it is the mother’s sensitivity and general interest in the infant that causes the differences in attachment.

Many later experiments found that insecurely attached children, type A and type C, are more likely to have behavioural or cognitive problems; low self esteem and increased risk of depression, (Posada, Lord and Walters (1995) Speltz, Greenberg and Deklyn (1990) and Walster et al (1995).

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Ainsworth (1989) found that although attachment in both parent-child, and partner bonds have many differences, there are important similarities. Both feel safe when the other is nearby and responsive, both engage in close, intimate bodily contact, both feel insecure when the other is inaccessible, both share discoveries with one another, both play with one another's facial features and exhibit a mutual fascination and preoccupation with one another, both engage in "baby talk".

Hazan and Shaver (1993) suggest that adult lovers can be securely attached, avoidantly attached and anxiously attached, just as babies, in Ainsworth’s “Strange Situation” study. They said that they acquire this from how their parents cared for them, if they were securely attached as children they are likely to be securely attached to their adult romantic partners.

Hazan and Schaver designed a questionnaire to prove their hypothesis and posted it in the “Rocky News”, a Canadian magazine.

This questionnaire suggested that securely attached lovers found it relatively easy to get close to others, and were comfortable with self-disclosure, whereas avoidantly attached lovers found it difficult to trust completely, and feared self-disclosure, and commitment. Anxiously attached lovers on the other hand found others are reluctant to get as close as they would like, felt jealousy frequently, and had a need to “merge completely” with their love partner. Hazan and Schaver also set up a further adjective check list of how the participant remembers being cared for in their childhood.

They received 5000 replies from participants aged between 14 and 85.

They found that

56% were securely attached, 25% were avoidantly attached, The final 19% were anxiously attatched.

There was a strong positive correlation between attachment types and love relationships.

This study used a large participant sample, and a wide spread variety of ages, however all participants were self-selecting and thus we should hesitate before generalising these results to the population at large. This research is also correlational which prevents a clear cause and effect being found. Although it is probable that an individual’s childhood relationship to their parents might have some part in how they act in love relationships, it may not be the only cause. Also the attachment types were based on retrospective biased opinions, and thus the actual relationship may not be anything like the participant said.

However this experiment has been supported many times by Brennan and Shaver (1998) and Kirckpatrick and Davis (1994)

Aim:

The aim of the experiment is to test whether attachment styles help set a basis for older adult relationships, and whether any discrepancies in results is down to separation or discordance in early childhood. A strong positive correlation that attachment to adult relationships is down to attachment to parents was found by Hazan and Schaver.

The experimenter will adapt the statements from the Hazan and Shaver’s “love quiz” questionnaire, and will change the rating table so that it is easer to quantify.

A non directional two tailed hypothesis will be used.

Hypothesis: An infant’s attachment to their mother affects how they act in adult love relationships, therefore the answers given in the first section of the questionnaire, when quantified, will be equal to the answers given in the second part, unless there are any explanations, given in the third part, of why this might not be so. For example, death in early childhood.

Null Hypothesis: How strongly an infant is attached to their mother has no bearing on their adult relationships they are completely unrelated.

Design

The above was tested using repeated measures style questionnaire. A repeated measures design allows for the experimenter to correlate the participant’s childhood with their later love relationship.

The questionnaire consisted of three sections, firstly a section about attachment to an adult love partner, secondly about the attachment to their parents during childhood, and thirdly questions about separation and discord in the family.

The results of both parts or variables of the questionnaire was correlated. A correlation provides a high ecological validity, and precise information about the degree of a relationship between these two things, however it is impossible to say for sure that attachment is the only cause.

Variables and Ethics.

As this is a correlation the experimenter is balancing two co-variables together rather than measuring how far an independent variable is affected by the dependent variable. In this case the co-variables are the child’s attachment style (based on Ainsworth’s research) and their later love style.

Confounding variables can be extreme stress, illness, and divorce that might have affected the primary care giver in my participant’s childhood, as this has been said to shift an infant’s attachment type. The experimenter has tried to overcome this problem by asking about separation between the parents and infant during childhood; and also how the participant feels about their parent’s relationship to each other. Age, culture and timing may also affect the experimenter’s results, as they have been known to change how an individual feels about their partner, and love in general. The experimenter has tried try to over come this by surveying men and women of. different ages and cultures. Another disadvantage of this study is that the attachment style questionnaire is based on retrospective memories and thus not extremely valid, these may have changed due to retroactive memory displacement.

Outside variables may also affect the answers given, for example heat and noise. The experimenter has attempted to overcome this by asking participants in the same half an hour period.

Social desirability status may also effect results. Although during the brief and debrief the participant is assured their results are confidential they may feel they cannot trust the experimenter.

The questions asked may appear to some as very personal, so the experimenter has planned an effective and thorough debrief.

Participants

The researcher was an 18 year old female student. An opportunity sample of people in Ashford town centre on 28th July 2003. The individuals questioned were over the age of 25, as it is unlikely that anybody under this age has experienced a strong emotional attachment to a partner.

Apparatus and Materials

One questionnaire and a pen were required for each participant in the study.

There were three parts to the questionnaire. Firstly, eight questions were designed to help see an attachment type in the adult love relationship. These were statements about how they felt in the relationship with their partner, and how they saw their partners interactions to them. The participant had to rate how true to their experience they thought each statement was on a tendency scale, (ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree) .

For example

I feel/felt alternatively wonderful and miserable in the relationship with my partner

SD D NDA A SA

Eight further statements were designed to help see an attachment type in the participants childhood. These reports were similar, and about their parents support, and the interactions in the relationship, and were rated in the same way.

For example

I feel I have/had my parents full support in everything I do

SD D NDA A SA

Finally four questions designed to measure confounding variables, such as separation from attachment figure, or discordance in the family. The first two were questions on separation, the next were blanket statements about their parents relationship towards each other.

Procedures

Participants were approached in Ashford High Street and asked whether they could spend five minutes helping with a questionnaire that involved a maximum of twenty five questions. If they agreed, a list of standardised instructions were read out, (these can be found in appendix A). If they agreed to continue they were told the study is designed to test relationships about their partners and their parents. They were assured there data was confidential and that they could withdraw at any time. The participant was not given a time limit to complete the questions, as it is designed to test personal views and memories. After the participant had completed the questionnaire they were told about the attachment theory and that the experiment was designed to help test the validity of this, they were then asked if they would like to withdraw. They were thanked for their help.

In order to get the most effective and easy to read correlation the experimenter drew up a table that replaced the participant’s ratings of the first two sections with numbers. These numbers ranged from –4 to +4 in a sequence of two. The –4 were for the answers that were concurrent to insecure attachments and the +4 were for answers concurrent to the secure attachments, the 0 score were for the neither disagree or agree answers. These scores were then added up for both variables, and each part was plotted on a scattergram.