Attachment Theory For Adulthood Stages

Impact of Childhood Experiences in Adulthood Behavior

Discuss about the Attachment Theory for Adulthood Stages.

Attachment theory is a theory of social work which suggests that there is a strong bond that occurs between a child and his/her caretaker or parent. This bond creates a connection between the ancient way of life, behavior and experiences of the child and his/her later life, development, and behavior (Payne, 2014). The behavior of a person in adulthood stages, according to this theory is widely dictated by his/her childhood life. Such actions as stress management skills, ability to peacefully coexist with others in the society, emotional development as well as intellectual growth are strongly tied to the kind of care a person receives in childhood.

In line with the above explanations, it is only apparent according to this theory that the nature of early experiences of a child from their parents offers a great attachment to the following character of the life of a person. Parents are therefore viewed as providers of essential foundations for next social growth and competence of an infant.

The child gets initial and very vital experience from his/her caregiver. This early experience is important as it will dictate the way of life of a child in later stages of life. It provides a base of which a child forms his/her identity. This is ranked by their way of social life and social relationships (Payne, 2014). This also affects the brain development of a child since the early experiences are undergone by a child hardens a child and dictates the way they relate to the others in the community.

The above theory can be conveniently illustrated by evaluating the theme of domestic violence and existence of peaceful living in families. A child who is raised in a family where the parents constantly go to church will go to church when they grow up. Apparently, a child raised in an Islamic family will confidently go to the mosque. This is also true in the case of children raised in a family where both parents are pagans. They will not be comfortable in worship places.

Another good illustration of this theory is the case of domestic violence. In doing a critical examination of the causes and spread of domestic violence in the world, it can be noted from this theory, that children who are raised in families where their guardians or parents were constantly fighting, quarrelling or practicing any other forms of domestic violence, such as psychological violence, emotional violence, and physical abuse, will be used to such environments and hence when they grow up, they will tend to be violent in their own families. They will not be able to successfully adopt peaceful methods of solving the internal conflicts and disagreements that occur in their families (Connors, 2012)

Examples of Attachment Theory in Daily Life

The bonding developed through attachment between the infant, and the guardian is therefore used as bases for the classification of behavior. The test and assessment of the behavior of a person can, therefore, be based on the basis of attachment. This test is typically termed as strange situation test. This test can usually be conveniently be carried out to babies of between one to three years old (Antonio, 2012). This particular test examines whether the caregiver did attend effectively to the needs of an infant, or whether the infant really received the best care required such as shelter, social belonging, and comfort. It evaluates the confidence that the children may develop in the family, by viewing their parents as caring and loving. The parents have the opportunity to let the infants be confident that they are fully cared for. That their life structure is actually organized effectively.

Young children who secure a better attachment from parents through better care, love and belonging would develop better stress management skills and the ability to live a peaceful and social life in future (Connors, 2012). This makes attachment theory to be viewed as a basis on which normal and abnormal growth and development of a child can be evaluated in the society. The theory gives a clear psychological means of determining social growth (Connors, 2012). When the parents take good care of their children, the children normally trust them. The children then develop a sense of belonging to the family and develop a belief that they should be cared for, loved and guided appropriately.in this sense, the infants get to learn good behavior from their parents through these attachments.

Social work is a professional activity that involves helping people from different groups, families as well as communities to improve their living standards in the society (Walsh, 2013). It is geared towards improving people’s individual skills and strengths to enhance proper usage of resources in the community in problem solving and conflict resolution. (Floyd, 2015)

The social workers in carrying out their duties must greatly take into account the attachments that exist between the parents and their children in early stages, because of the following aspects (Mary, 2013).

People raised in violent families will tend to be violent and difficult to deal wth. This makes the social workers dedicate more time and skills to try and tame them so that they can understand the reasons for the social work. In order for them to accept any gifts or willingness to offer assistance to them in any way, the worker may spend much time convincing the person (Walsh, 2013)

Attachment Theory and Social Work

In addition to the above condition, such people may try to use violence to drive away social workers if they are not able to provide a convincing reason for their work. The social workers would also not expect a warm and peaceful welcome in such homes.

People raised in violent families will tend to be fearful and unable to associate freely with strangers. The social worker, being a stranger will, therefore, have a hard time in trying to communicate with such people who only understand violence. The social worker will be forced to hire a person known in such a community in order to try to cool down and try to convince the person to interact with the social worker (Teater, 2013).

People raised in peaceful families where there are good care and love will have a better mental growth and excellent communication skills with others, this will give social workers easy time in communicating with such people. This simplifies the process of social work and makes it more enjoyable.

People raised peacefully with good parents showing them love, care and belonging always have good skills to relate with others freely and without fear. This it because of the confidence he/she develops from childhood. The social worker will, therefore, have the easiest time ever in dealing with them. They will give the social worker a real welcoming. They will also tend to have better understanding and communication skills.

The social worker must, therefore, try to investigate and understand the existing attachments, in order to be able to handle their clients appropriately (Amanda, 2015). Understanding the bonds enables the social worker to familiarize with the behavior of the clients he/she will be handling in the community and handle them with professionalism.

Attachment theory can be used to evaluate different fields of practice. One of them is domestic violence.

Domestic violence refers to conflicts that occur in the family. It can be classified as, social violence, financial violence, emotional violence, physical violence, and psychological violence. Emotional and psychological violence refers to disagreements that result in int quarrels, abuse, and abandonment or separation. On the other hand, physical abuse involves inflicting pain on the body of an opponent through hitting, wounding or burning someone. Domestic violence is widely related to attachment theory (Colmer, 2011). The social worker when trying to solve any domestic violence must, therefore, examine and have a clear understanding of the client’s earlier social background.

Attachment Theory and Domestic Violence

In solving domestic violence, the social worker must seek appropriate clarity of the clients earlier life, focus on it and try to evaluate how it affects his/her life (Healy, 2014). This helps the worker in adopting an evaluated problem-solving technique.

When the social worker gains the knowledge of the earlier life of the client, he can come up with a graded method of dealing with the customer to solve their problem (Wendt, 2012). For example, the client may have been raised in a violent family set up. In this case, the worker can know the cause of violence.

Knowing the early life of the client also enables the worker to be able to know how to interact with the customer in solving domestic conflicts. The worker would know that people who were not appropriately and peacefully raised will not be willing to easily share their problems with the employee. This will make the worker apply more skills in trying to persuade the client to give him information.

The attachments also act as a major determinant of behavior. The clients practicing domestic violence are mostly copying the kind of life they lived in childhood. They are also not very developed intellectually. This will give the social worker hard time in solving their conflicts.

Domestic violence is also connected to the poor brain development of the clients. The families that constantly fight are prone to elements of madness, irresponsible drinking, and improper reasoning. These are only signs of poor intellectual capacity and abnormal brain development. The social worker must, therefore, understand the existing bonds when trying to find solutions to domestic violence within families (Chenoweth, 2015).

People who grow in violent families also fail to gain an understanding of the importance of caring for their families and children. They will tend to be harsh to their children and even molest them. This is a sign of domestic violence whose roots are derived from earlier attachments.

The attachment theory is therefore very vital evaluating causes of domestic violence. The social worker must be aware of the history of attachment to handle their clients appropriately and solve domestic conflicts.

Attachment theory is the best theory that tries to determine behavior and the causes of different behavior. This theory is very useful in understanding the causes of social problems such as domestic violence (Edwina, 2013).

 The attachment theory is important in bonding. The infant is always bonded to the parents. The type of parental care the infant receives, therefore, determines the nature of the early life of the child

Attachment theory also forms a basis for determining behavior. It is a vital theory used by social workers in trying to understand and communicate to clients of different social setting (Healy, 2013).

 The available attachments dictate the level of intellectual growth of a person. This enables the social workers to be able to predict the degree of reasoning of their clients and link it to their earlier nature of life(Chenoweth, 2015).

Also, attachment theory is a major determinant of the existence of peace or violence in the family. Earlier violent life causes the existence of violence lived by the  person in childhood

Lastly, the attachment theory is very essential in developing links between the mothers and their babies. This enables determination of the causes of the problems both mental and psychological, experienced by people in their later stages of life (Dewan, 2013).

This theory has been prone to several critiques.The postmodern thought has posed several questions about the attachment theory. This has made some social workers to adopt the postmodernist school of thought at the expense of this theory. The critiques posed by the post-modern thought on this theory includes the following;

The attachment theory fails to consider other factors such as environmental factors and ecological determinants in developing attachment relationship.

The behavior of a child can also be caused by other factors, not just the attachment factor. The behavior o a child is more complex as it can be influenced by other factors such as the environment, poverty and other people interacting with the child, not just the caregiver (Morgan, 2014).

In addition to the above critique, the attachment theory also ignores the fact that human beings can self-repair, although it is a fact that people can change behavior over time through continuous learning, interaction with other people and experience.

Lastly, the attachment theory adopts a discriminative type of reasoning. The mothers in the society are viewed to have less power. This theory does not give other vital roles of mothers in the society and in nurturing their children priority. This makes some people to adopt postmodernism.

The attachment theory is also less scientific in nature. When it is compared with postmodern thought, the postmodern theory adopts a more scientific and accepted method of evaluating behavior (Delaney, 2012). The postmodern theory scientifically evaluates other factors that may influence behavior apart from just the attachment factor.

Conclusion

Comparing the strengths and the weaknesses of the attachment theory, it can be clearly deduced from the above arguments that the attachment theory has more strengths. It is, therefore, a relevant theory in determining and evaluating behavior. It makes it clear that their early life mostly dictates behavior of children and their way of life in the later stages. That is the kind of care, love, and orientations they received from their caregivers (Katherine, 2014).

This theory is specifically applicable when examining domestic violence within families. It is apparent that the way of life of a person in childhood influences his brain growth, his intellectual growth, his way of reasoning and his ability to control stress. These are the major aspects that cause or reduce domestic violence. Therefore studying the attachments in the social life of a person will enable the social worker to identify the causes of internal conflict, evaluate them and find appropriate solutions (Weedon, 2015).  

Reference

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