Transcription
[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] we'll have you do a brief interaction with some play. Then in just a few minutes, we'll send you back in. Step in the door. Ever Waters is studying how far our childhood experiences influence our behavior as adults. We'll come down to the lab, okay? Do this now.
This experiment, which I watched through a two-way mirror, is designed to gauge how secure is the crucial relationship between mother and child. This bunny is going to go here, and that bunny will be on top. The value of the test has been established in studies that would watch a child one-year-old and then follow it up and interview them about the relationships to their parents when they were 21 years old. So we're quite confident in the long-term significance of this relationship.
After several minutes play, the mother is signaled to leave the room. "Sweetie, I'll be back in one minute." "Okay, I'll get you back in one minute for you." I feel but she'll survive. The key moment in the experiment is the child's reaction to her mother's return. The important clue is whether the baby's able to become calmed down by the contact with the mother. Get back to play. Sometimes it takes a couple of minutes. You see, when the mother was out, she was only interested in the mother, no interest in the toys. Now she has a contact with the mother, she's beginning to show a little interest in the environment, and shortly she'll be right back with the toys where we started.
So you would call this a secure one? Yes. Yes, she's certainly much happier now.
This is an insecure baby. We get the measure of the baby's play before the separation. When the mother leaves, the baby cries, goes to the door, following her. Now, now we we sent the mother right back in, but the point here is not to distress the baby, we're just trying to challenge it. The baby puts her hands to her face, a sad expression, puts her face down. When she picks her up, she keeps her head down, her arms out, and then she sits in the chair holding the baby. The baby's still solemn, he's low-key.
So you would call this insecure? Att- insecure. He's avoidant. He's he's not engaging her, and it's not being the reunion is not effective. It's important to remember here that the thing that upset him was her absence. Her her return should be the solution to his problem.
Now, this is another pattern that we see in babies who are not good at using their mother as a secure base at home. This baby is also insecure, but you'll see. We get a look at his play before the separation. Mother's left. When she returns, she picks him up. He can't calm down, he's still upset. She offers a toy to amuse him, or to comfort him, or to distract him, and he slaps it away. She offers another, he slaps it away. He's angry. He's he's we call these babies resistant or ambivalent because they both want her back and yet can't use the contact.
We I think that the difficulty is that in the past, when he sought comfort, she's been inconsistent as to whether she's available and responsive or not.
Do you think these really are indications for vulnerability for depression later in life? I don't think that insecure attachment in infancy is the cause of depression in adulthood. However, when a child learns that he can trust his mother to be available and responsive, he's beginning to learn that you can trust other people, that you can turn to them when you're in trouble. The baby is also taught by the mother, as he gets older, how to understand his emotions, how to construe events that happen to them. You know, every bump in the road is not a disaster. This is a powerful asset when you encounter difficulties in life.
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