Attachment Measures for Research and Practice

Abstract

Strategies and specific measures for assessing attachment in infancy and childhood are reviewed. The review highlights that, although the evidence base for a number of measures is now strong, the incorporation of these measures into clinical practice has been slow. Some of the practical barriers to include attachment measures in clinical practice are considered, and ideas for overcoming these barriers are proposed.

Reactive Attachment Disorder in the General Population: A Hidden ESSENCE Disorder

“…The child's story is videotaped and subjected to structured coding based on the SSP and Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) codes to provide an attachment classification [19]. It has good interrater reliability, stability of attachment patterns over time, and concurrent validity with well-validated measures of attachment [20]. …”

Matching parenting support needs to service provision in a universal 13‐month child health surveillance visit

“…The measurement of parent–child attachment in routine practice has received a good deal of attention in the literature (O'Connor & Gerard Byrne 2007), but there are no standardized and simple tools for its rapid assessment (Lim et al . 2010), and the context of the 13‐month visit does not provide the stressful situation most desirable for doing so (Ainsworth et al .…”

The Self-Report Assessment of Adolescent Attachment: A Systematic Review and Critique

“…A number of reviews of some extant attachment measures for adults and children have been published (Crowell & Treboux, 1995;Dwyer, 2005;O'Connor & Byrne, 2007;Schneider, Atkinson, & Tardif, 2001). However, this has not been done comprehensively for adolescents since Rice (1990), prior to major developments in the attachment literature which have since influenced more contemporary attachment measurement strategies (i.e., Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991;Brennan et al, 1998;Griffin & Bartholomew, 1994).…”