Relations between attachment dimensions, internal working models, and young children's response to pain.
Date
2004
Authors
Walsh, Trudi M.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Dalhousie University
Abstract
Description
This study examined the relations between attachment dimensions and child pain behaviour following both an everyday pain incident (e.g., bumps and scrapes) and acute pain incident (i.e., immunization). Sixty-six five-year-old children and their mothers were seen at a university psychology department, at which time mothers completed a demographic questionnaire and a measure of their children's emotion regulation behaviour. They were also given everyday pain incident report forms to fill out at home. In a separate testing room, children completed representational measures of attachment (i.e., Separation Anxiety Test and Pain and Relationship Task), an emotional labelling task, and a measure of receptive language. Mothers were reunited with their children at the end of the session and reunions were coded for attachment behaviour. Attachment dimensions were assessed using aggregates of lab-based reunion behaviour, performance on representational measures of attachment, and the measure of emotion regulation. Aggregate measures of security, avoidance, ambivalence, and controlling behaviour were created. During the second session at a medical centre, children were videotaped receiving their medically indicated inoculation shots. Child pain behaviour and child-parent verbalizations during the immunization were rated by blind coders. Following the needles, both mothers and children provided ratings of subjective pain intensity and pain behaviour. The results showed the ambivalence and controlling attachment were differentially related to child pain behaviour. Specifically, children with either more ambivalent or controlling attachment had a relatively greater reaction to both the immunization procedure and everyday pain incident. Children with more controlling attachment also took more time to calm down following the immunization, displayed greater anger, and reacted with more resistant behaviour during the immunization. Security and avoidance, however, were not systematically related to child pain behaviour. The results are discussed in terms of Bowlby's theory of attachment relationships and pain as an important distress signal to children.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Dalhousie University (Canada), 2004.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Dalhousie University (Canada), 2004.
Keywords
Psychology, Behavioral.