Infant attachment and later friendships

Introduction: Researchers wanted to know whether the quality of an infant's attachment to a caregiver is related to how well that child gets along with peers years later. They followed the same children from infancy to age 10.

Participants: The researchers recruited 212 infants (104 girls and 108 boys) and their primary caregivers at 12-month checkups at pediatric clinics in two mid-sized cities in the midwestern United States. Caregivers reported the infants' race/ethnicity as 52% White, 21% Black, 17% Hispanic or Latino, 6% Asian and 4% multiracial. Of the 212 families, 186 (88%) were still taking part when the children turned 10.

Method: A university institutional review board approved the study. Caregivers gave written informed consent at the start and again at the age-10 follow-up, and children gave their own assent at age 10. All records were stored under ID numbers.

At 12 months, each infant and caregiver came to a playroom for a standard 20-minute observation in which the caregiver left the room twice for up to three minutes, once while a friendly stranger was present. If an infant cried hard for more than 30 seconds, the caregiver returned right away. Two trained observers watching through a one-way mirror rated each infant's attachment security from 1 (very insecure) to 9 (very secure), based mostly on how the infant greeted the caregiver and was comforted when the caregiver returned. They also classified each infant as securely or insecurely attached.

At age 10, each child's classroom teacher, who knew nothing about the child's infant ratings, completed a 20-item questionnaire about the child's peer relationships (for example, 'Other children invite this child to join their activities'). Each item was rated from 1 (never) to 5 (almost always), giving a peer competence score from 20 to 100.

Results and Discussion: For the 186 children with data at both ages, infant attachment security scores were positively correlated with peer competence scores at age 10 (r = +0.34), a statistically significant relationship. The table compares the two attachment classifications. Many individual children did not follow the overall pattern. The researchers noted that other factors, such as a child's temperament or stress in the family, could be related to both early attachment and later friendships.