Mother–Child Attachment From Infancy to the Preschool Years: Predicting Security and Stability

TY - JOUR

T1 - Mother–Child Attachment From Infancy to the Preschool Years

T2 - Predicting Security and Stability

AU - Meins, Elizabeth

AU - Bureau, Jean-Francois

AU - Fernyhough, Charles

N1 - © 2017 The Authors Child Development © 2017 Society for Research in Child Development, Inc. This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details.

PY - 2018/5/10

Y1 - 2018/5/10

N2 - Relations between maternal mind-mindedness (appropriate and nonattuned mind-related comments), children's age-2 perspective-taking abilities, and attachment security at 44 (n = 165) and 51 (n = 128) months were investigated. Nonattuned comments predicted insecure preschool attachment, via insecure 15-month attachment security (44-month attachment) and poorer age-2 perspective-taking abilities (51-month attachment). With regard to attachment stability, higher perspective-taking abilities distinguished the stable secure groups from (a) the stable insecure groups and (b) children who changed from secure to insecure (at trend level). These effects were independent of child gender, stressful life events, and socioeconomic status (SES). The contribution of these findings to our understanding of stability and change in attachment security from infancy to the preschool years is discussed.

AB - Relations between maternal mind-mindedness (appropriate and nonattuned mind-related comments), children's age-2 perspective-taking abilities, and attachment security at 44 (n = 165) and 51 (n = 128) months were investigated. Nonattuned comments predicted insecure preschool attachment, via insecure 15-month attachment security (44-month attachment) and poorer age-2 perspective-taking abilities (51-month attachment). With regard to attachment stability, higher perspective-taking abilities distinguished the stable secure groups from (a) the stable insecure groups and (b) children who changed from secure to insecure (at trend level). These effects were independent of child gender, stressful life events, and socioeconomic status (SES). The contribution of these findings to our understanding of stability and change in attachment security from infancy to the preschool years is discussed.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85041716886&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1111/cdev.12778

DO - 10.1111/cdev.12778

M3 - Article

SN - 0009-3920

VL - 89

SP - 1022

EP - 1038

JO - Child Development

JF - Child Development

IS - 3

ER -