Consultation in institutional care: an exploratory study focused on attachment development in the early age

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K13137
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Clinical psychology
• Research Institution: Ochanomizu University
• Principal Investigator: Aoki Kikuyo お茶の水女子大学, 基幹研究院, 准教授 (10254129)
• Co-Investigator(Renkei-kenkyūsha): IKEMURA Kiyomi 帝京大学, 文学部, 教授 (80201911)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 愛着行動 / 乳児院 / 縦断的観察 / SSP / コンサルテーション

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The purpose of this study is to examine the process of attachment development in institution-cared infants through longitudinal observation. The participants were ten infants from 3 institutions in various area of Japan. Video observation was used in this study and the development of attachment was accessed monthly with checklist of attachment behaviors after the infants reached one month old. Attachment pattern was assessed with the Strange Situation Procedure (SSP) after the infants can walk before 18th month. The results indicated that the development of attachment in these infants was basically not different from family-cared infants although there is a distinguished decrease in achievement ratio at the 4th month. Furthermore, most of the participants showed secure attachment in the SSP. From this study, we made the leaflet which showed attachment process in infants and used for psychological consultation in the institutions.

Free Research Field

臨床心理学