| Course | PS 210 Psychology of Child and Adolescence |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 3 |
| Paper type | Attachment and family paper |
| Length | About 1,040 words, 6 pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Herzing University |
| Program | BS in Psychology |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for PS 210 Unit 3
Twenty Minutes in an Unfamiliar Room: What the Strange Situation Established About Early Attachment, What It Did Not, and How Culture, Child Care and Family Context Qualify the Findings
Student Name
Psychology, Herzing University
PS 210: Psychology of Child and Adolescence
Instructor Name
January 27, 2026
Twenty Minutes in an Unfamiliar Room: What the Strange Situation Established About Early Attachment, What It Did Not, and How Culture, Child Care and Family Context Qualify the Findings
A Literature With a Reputation
Attachment research has a reputation that runs ahead of its evidence. In popular writing, a baby's attachment classification is sometimes presented as a fixed label that predicts adult relationships and can be damaged by ordinary parenting choices such as using child care. This paper reports what the classification studies established, what they did not, and how caregiving context and family structure qualify each finding. It does not set out to defend or attack attachment theory as a whole.
The Procedure Behind the Classifications
Most classification research uses the Strange Situation, a laboratory procedure developed by Ainsworth et al. (1978). Over about twenty minutes, a year-old infant and a caregiver, usually the mother, go through a series of brief episodes in an unfamiliar room: playing together, a stranger entering, the caregiver leaving the infant with the stranger, the caregiver returning, the infant left alone and the caregiver returning again. Researchers pay particular attention to the reunions. Infants classified as secure seek the caregiver on return and are comforted. Infants classified as insecure-avoidant show little distress and tend to ignore the caregiver on return, and those classified as insecure-resistant are highly distressed and difficult to settle, mixing contact seeking with anger. A fourth classification, disorganized, was added later for infants whose behavior lacks a coherent strategy.
The procedure measures one relationship, with one caregiver, at one point in time, in one kind of stressful situation. That description already limits what any single classification can mean.
What the Classification Studies Established
Patterns are recognizable across cultures, with differences in distribution
Van IJzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988) combined Strange Situation studies from eight countries. Secure attachment was the most common classification in every country studied, which supports the idea that the procedure captures something widely shared. But the distribution of insecure classifications differed: avoidant classifications were relatively more common in Western European samples, and resistant classifications relatively more common in Israeli and Japanese samples. They also found more variation within countries than between them, a reminder that culture is not the only influence.
Classifications relate modestly to later behavior
Fearon et al. (2010) conducted a meta-analysis of studies relating early attachment to later externalizing behavior problems in children. Insecure attachment, and especially disorganized attachment, was associated with more externalizing problems later, but the effects were small to moderate. Many insecurely attached children did not develop problems, and many children with problems had been securely attached.
What the Studies Did Not Establish
They did not establish that a classification at twelve months fixes a child's future. Relationships change as circumstances change, and an infant's classification reflects the relationship at that time. They did not establish that insecure attachment causes later problems; the associations are correlational, and family stress, poverty or temperament could contribute to both. And they did not establish that the patterns mean the same thing everywhere. A behavior that looks avoidant in one culture may reflect a culture's expectations for independence rather than a problem in the relationship, which is why the cross-cultural differences matter.
Why the Disorganized Category Needs Care
The disorganized classification carries the strongest associations in the meta-analytic evidence, which makes it the most likely to be misused. Fearon et al. (2010) found its link to later externalizing problems larger than that of the other insecure categories, but still far from deterministic. The classification depends on trained coders noticing brief, contradictory behaviors during reunions, such as freezing or approaching the caregiver with the head turned away, and it is meant for research groups, not for labeling an individual child outside a properly conducted assessment. Writing that treats disorganization as a diagnosis, or that describes particular children as disorganized on the basis of ordinary distress, goes far beyond what the procedure was built to support. A responsible paper reports the finding, its effect size and its research setting, and leaves classification of any real child to qualified professionals using the full procedure.
Caregiving Context: The Child Care Question
The most consequential popular claim has concerned child care. A large federally funded project, the NICHD Study of Early Child Care, followed more than 1,100 families (NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 1997) from ten sites in the United States and tested whether child care in the first year affected infant-mother attachment at fifteen months. Child care by itself, including its quality, amount and age of entry, did not predict attachment security. Maternal sensitivity and responsiveness did. The study did find that combinations of factors mattered: infants were somewhat more likely to be insecure when low maternal sensitivity was combined with poor-quality care, many hours of care or more than one change in care arrangements.
This is a careful finding. It does not say child care never matters; it says that the quality of the relationship at home was the main predictor, and that child care mattered mainly where it added to existing risk.
Family Structure
The classic research studied mothers, often in two-parent, middle-class households. Children form attachments to fathers, grandparents and other regular caregivers, and the Strange Situation can be used with any of them. A child may be secure with one caregiver and insecure with another, which again shows that the classification describes a relationship rather than a trait of the child. Families with single parents, same-sex parents, grandparents raising grandchildren or several caregivers sharing the work are not adequately described by a literature built mainly on mothers, and claims about such families should be made cautiously and with evidence from studies that included them.
Conclusion
The classification research established recognizable patterns of infant behavior in a standard situation, a predominance of secure attachment across many countries, and modest associations between insecure, especially disorganized, attachment and later behavior problems. It did not establish fixed outcomes, simple causes or a harmful effect of ordinary child care. The gap between those two lists is where most popular claims about attachment live. Reading the research carefully does not reduce its value; it shows that what matters most in the evidence, a caregiver's sensitivity, is also something families and child care settings can support.
References
Ainsworth, M. D. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: A psychological study of the strange situation. Lawrence Erlbaum.
Fearon, R. P., Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J., van IJzendoorn, M. H., Lapsley, A.-M., & Roisman, G. I. (2010). The significance of insecure attachment and disorganization in the development of children's externalizing behavior: A meta-analytic study. Child Development, 81(2), 435-456. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01405.x
NICHD Early Child Care Research Network. (1997). The effects of infant child care on infant-mother attachment security: Results of the NICHD Study of Early Child Care. Child Development, 68(5), 860-879. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1997.tb01967.x
van IJzendoorn, M. H., & Kroonenberg, P. M. (1988). Cross-cultural patterns of attachment: A meta-analysis of the strange situation. Child Development, 59(1), 147-156. https://doi.org/10.2307/1130396
PS 210 Unit 3 instructions, in plain terms
The third PS 210 unit asks students to write about attachment and family with attention to evidence. Expect to describe the classification procedure, report what the studies established about early relationships, state clearly what they did not establish, and show how caregiving context and family structure qualify the findings. The paper does not have to defend attachment theory; reporting its findings accurately, including their limits, is the task. Non-traditional family structures should be discussed with evidence from studies that included them, not assumptions. Writing about your own childhood is not recommended, because it substitutes memory for evidence and shares personal history. Effect sizes should be reported at their actual size rather than described loosely.
Inside the PS 210 Unit 3 example
Opening with attachment's popular reputation, the sample describes the Strange Situation and the four classifications, noting what one procedure can measure. Two findings follow with their studies: cross-cultural patterns with within-country variation, and modest links to later externalizing problems. A section lists what the studies did not establish. Another explains why the disorganized category needs care in writing. The child care section reports the NICHD study's design and its finding that sensitivity mattered most, with the combinations that raised risk. A family structure section addresses caregivers beyond mothers, and the conclusion contrasts the two lists. Each section names the study behind its claim.
PS 210 Unit 3 rubric: what full points look like
Herzing's rubric for the attachment and family paper usually awards points for an accurate description of the classification procedure, findings reported with design and effect size, a clear account of what was not established, attention to culture, caregiving context and family structure, and careful writing. Description earns credit when the procedure's scope is stated. Findings score when effects are reported at their actual size. The criterion on what was not established is often decisive, rewarding papers that challenge popular overstatements with evidence. Context earns points when child care and culture are discussed through studies. Careful writing is credited when classifications are not used as labels. Reports that keep the procedure's scope in view throughout tend to do best.
PS 210 Unit 3 help: mistakes that cost points
Attachment papers lose points when they present an infant's classification as a fixed prediction of adult life. Another common weakness is reporting associations as causes. Students often repeat the claim that child care harms attachment without checking the NICHD findings. Some treat the disorganized category as a diagnosis. Others ignore culture or assume every family has a mother as primary caregiver. Personal childhood stories rarely add evidence. If you need help separating attachment's reputation from its findings, our writers can draft a paper built on the studies. Describing a classification as a trait of the child, rather than of one relationship, is a quieter error. Treating cross-cultural differences as defects in other cultures also costs credit.
Get a PS 210 Unit 3 example written to your instructions
Drop the Unit 3 instructions into the thread with the PS 210 rubric from your classroom and whichever readings your section assigns on early relationships. We build a custom example that describes the procedure first, reports findings at their real strength and gives context and limits full sections. First custom sample free, 24 to 48 hours.
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PS 210 Unit 3 questions, answered
Does the paper have to defend attachment theory?
No. The criterion rewards an accurate report, not an endorsement, and the strongest papers state clearly where the evidence is strong, where it is thin and where researchers still disagree. If your reading contains a critique, use it and attribute it. What fails is a paper that presents contested claims as established, in either direction, without saying who established them.
How should the paper handle non-traditional family structures?
As contexts, not as variables to be ranked. Children are raised by grandparents, single parents, adoptive and foster families, and extended households, and the research reads early relationships inside whichever arrangement exists. Describe what studies have found in different arrangements, attribute each finding, and avoid any sentence that sorts family forms into better and worse. The evidence does not support that sorting.
My own childhood illustrates this well. Can I write about it?
Your own upbringing is yours to keep out of coursework. Writing about your own upbringing also puts a parent or sibling into a document read by strangers, without their agreement. Some sections invite a short reflective note in a discussion post rather than in the paper, so check your instructions. For the analysis itself, argue from the published studies.
Where can I find a free PS 210 Unit 3 sample paper?
Read the whole PS 210 Unit 3 attachment and family paper here without charge, with the Strange Situation, the meta-analyses, the child care study and margin notes. Focusing on a different question about attachment? Email the instructions and a matching paper comes back free, often within two days.
Does PS 210 Unit 3 have to defend attachment theory?
No. The sample reports what the studies established and what they did not, including modest effect sizes and the NICHD finding on child care, without arguing for or against the theory as a whole.