A Family Systems Perspective on Attachment Security and Dependency to Mother and Father in Preschool: Differential and Reciprocal Effects on Children's Emotional and Behavioral Problems

Attachment security and dependency play a decisive role for children's mental health. From a family systems perspective, reciprocal effects of dyadic attachment to each parent within the same family on child symptomatology may well offer additional insights in developmental processes as parents and children influence each other consistently. This study examined the influence of child-mother as well as child-father attachment security and dependency on maternal, paternal, and observed ratings of children's emotional and behavioral problems. A total of 124 families with preschool children participated in this study. Attachment security, dependency, and symptomatology of the children were independently observed during home visits. Furthermore, mothers and fathers rated child symptoms. Results revealed promotive effects of attachment security to both parents on observed child symptoms. Furthermore, we found a significant actor effect of child-mother attachment security, as well as a significant partner effect of child-father dependency on maternal ratings of child symptomatology. Attachment security to both parents is promotive for child mental health. The family systems perspective clarifies the meaning of child-father relationships for maternal perception of the own child.

Cross-cultural comparison of maternal mind-mindedness among Australian and Chinese mothers

Evidence suggests that parental mind-mindedness is important for children’s social-emotional development; however, almost all research exploring mind-mindedness has been conducted with families from Western backgrounds. The current study explored cross-cultural differences in mind-mindedness based on observed real-time interactions between urban Australian ( N = 50, M age = 30.34 years, SD = 3.14) and urban mainland Chinese ( N = 50, M age = 29.18 years, SD = 4.14) mothers and their toddlers (Australian: M age = 18.98 months, SD = 0.87; Chinese: M age = 18.50 months, SD = 2.25). Controlling for education, the Australian mothers used a higher proportion of appropriate mind-related comments and were less likely to use non-attuned mind-related comments than their Chinese counterparts, adjusting for total number of comments. Transcript analysis showed that the Australian mothers used more mental state terms referring to desires and preferences than Chinese mothers. Findings are discussed in relation to cultural influences in child-rearing goals, beliefs, and values and the need for cross-cultural validation of the mind-mindedness construct.

Attachment representations of school-aged Korean children: comparing family drawing and narrative assessments in a clinical and a community sample

This study explored the links between two different methods of assessing children's attachment representations, a narrative task (the Manchester Attachment Story Task, MCAST) and a drawing task (the Family Drawing Task, FDT), in a clinical sample of 51 and a community sample of 45 Korean children aged 7-9. In both samples, attachment classifications derived from the MCAST were related to attachment classifications and global ratings derived from the FDT. In addition, rates of insecure attachment determined by MCAST classifications and by FDT global scales indicative of insecure attachment were higher in the clinical sample than the community sample. Variations in attachment patterns for these Korean samples are discussed in relation to Korean child-rearing customs. Results of this study contribute to the cross-cultural validation of both of these instruments, as well as extending our understanding of patterns of attachment in Korea from infancy to middle childhood.