Attachment in the early years

This free course, Attachment in the early years, covers theory and research in the area of attachment in early childhood. In the 1950s, John Bowlby was the first person to develop a theory about the significance of early attachments between caregivers and very young children. His work has stimulated a massive and very productive field of research with important implications for childcare. This OpenLearn course describes Bowlby's theory and the work that has built on it, illustrated with video recordings of the assessment of attachment in a laboratory setting and a talk by an eminent attachment researcher.

• Introduction
• Learning outcomes
• 1 Introduction to attachment
• 1 Introduction to attachment
• 1.1 The needs of immature young
• 1.2 Attachment and human evolution
• 2 Attachment theory
• 2 Attachment theory
• 2.1 Internal working models
• 2.2 What Bowlby did and didn’t say
• Mother as single attachment figure?
• Rigidity of IWMs
• 2.3 ‘Good-enough’ mothering
• 3 Attachment classification
• 3 Attachment classification
• 3.1 Attachment and internal working models
• 4 Influences on attachment
• 4 Influences on attachment
• 4.1 Sensitivity
• 4.2 Emotional communication
• 4.3 Mind-mindedness
• 5 Stability of attachment into later childhood
• 5 Stability of attachment into later childhood
• 5.1 Genetic and environmental influences
• 5.2 Interventions to enhance attachment security
• 6 Strange Situation Test
• 6 Strange Situation Test
• Conclusion
• Glossary
• References
• Further reading
• Acknowledgements