The specificity of mother's attachment to her child at an early age in the normal and severe dysontogenesis

Abstract

The study is focused on characteristics of attachment between a mother and her child of an early age. We have studied both families with typically developing children and families with children having signs of severe developmental disorders. The main purpose of the study was to study the factors of individual differences in the attachment styles of mothers to their children in different types of families. The study was carried out with the help of observation of parent-child interaction, semi-structured interviews about the representations of the mother's primary affection, questionnaires about the quality of parent-child interaction, EcoCard. The study involved 32 mother-child dyads with normative development of the child and severe dysontogenesis. According to the results, the quality of primary attachment between a mother and her young child is related to the peculiarities of the child's development, to the peculiarities of the mother's social and family ties and to the quality of representation of the mother's primary attachment, but in the comparison groups these connections are different.

Keywords

• factors and conditions of the quality of attachment
• representations of the primary attachment
• the child of early age
• severe dysontogenesis