There Are Many Factors

There are many factors that help shape and mold us through our development across the lifespan. One of our earliest aspects of social and personality development is the formation of attachment to others. Attachment is defined as a positive emotional bond that occurs between a developing child and a specific individual (Feldman 2011). Research has shown that these early bonds that are formed between infants and a caregiver can be crucial to the social relationships throughout a lifetime. Early studies seemed to think attachments were biologically driven. However, later researchers such as Harlow and psychiatrist John Bowlby indicated that infants developed special relationships with individuals that provided warmth and safety (Feldman 2011). There works also showed that in these cases it was primarily the mother whom the bond was made.

This leads to the question of are there different types of attachments to a mother versus a father.

While there is no doubt that there are biological differences in the parents research has shown that bonding with the father has great influence on social and emotional well-being as the child grows older (Feldman 2011). A lot of these relationships simply depend on how the caregiver responds to needs or the gestures of the infant. When children with secure attachment become distressed, they seek increased proximity with their caregivers by displaying attachment behaviors which signal the caregiver to respond and soothe (Wilson 2009). This student has experienced some examples of issues dealing with attachment between myself and my four year old son. He would scream when being dropped off for pre-school, but when I called to check on him moments later he was laughing and running around with the other children. My observation was that this writer provided him the safety and comfort was he needed at that given time. His ability to have secure attachments also allowed him to trust that I would return to pick him...