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Newborn Irritability Moderates the Association Between Infant Attachment Security and Toddler Exploration and Sociability
Author(s) -
Stupica Brandi,
Sherman Laura J.,
Cassidy Jude
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01638.x
Subject(s) - irritability , toddler , psychology , developmental psychology , insecure attachment , strange situation , association (psychology) , clinical psychology , attachment theory , cognition , psychiatry , psychotherapist
This longitudinal investigation of 84 infants examined whether the effect of 12‐month attachment on 18‐ and 24‐month exploration and sociability with unfamiliar adults varied as a function of newborn irritability. As expected, results revealed an interaction between attachment (secure vs. insecure) and irritability (highly irritable vs. moderately irritable) in predicting both exploration and sociability with unfamiliar adults. For exploration, results supported a dual‐risk model; that is, toddlers who had been both highly irritable and insecurely attached were less exploratory than other toddlers. For sociability, results supported the differential‐susceptibility hypothesis; that is, highly irritable infants, compared to moderately irritable infants, were both less sociable as toddlers when they had been insecurely attached and more sociable when they had been securely attached.