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Poster #133 - Change in Secure Base Script Knowledge During Middle Childhood and Early-Adolescence: A Three-Year Longitudinal Study

Thu, March 21, 12:30 to 1:45pm, Baltimore Convention Center, Floor: Level 1, Exhibit Hall B

Integrative Statement

Attachment theory has long emphasized stability; however, the extant literature also suggests that ongoing experiences shape attachment representations (i.e., lawful change; Sroufe, et al., 2005). For example, studies have found links between major stressors such as parental divorce or loss of an attachment figure and decreases in attachment security (e.g., Allen et al., 2004; Waters, et al. 2000). In addition, factors such as dyadic relatedness and supportive maternal care have been linked to significant gains in children's attachment security (e.g., Allen et al., 2004).
Although many have explored the contributing factors to stability and change of attachment security, most questions have been directed toward infancy, adolescence, and adulthood. As a result, relatively little is known about how attachment unfolds during middle childhood. This is a critical developmental period given that middle childhood marks the early beginnings of substantial biological and socioemotional changes within the child.
In the present study, we examined change in a prospective longitudinal study which has already demonstrated significant stability in attachment across a 3-year, 4-assessment, period (Bosmans et al., 2015). Specifically, we examine links between life stress and change in secure base script knowledge over time.
One-hundred and fifty-seven children and their mothers from Belgium (M age = 10.93 years, SD = 0.88 years) were administered the Attachment Script Assessment (ASA). The ASA is a fictional storytelling task consisting of three to four attachment relevant scenarios used to assess knowledge of the secure base script. Each story is coded from 1-7. Negative life events were assessed using the Adolescent Life Events Questionnaire (ALEQ). Items are categorized as either "Daily Hassles" or "Big Events" and children rate their perceived severity from mild to severe.
As previously reported (Bosmans et al., 2015), children's secure base script scores were significantly correlated at all waves (rs range = .41 to .65, all ps < .001; see also Table 1). Results were robust to demographic covariates (i.e., child age, sex, and parent education). Focal analyses examining stressful life events and rank-order change in secure base script knowledge revealed that daily hassles, but not major stressful life events, significantly predicted change in secure base script knowledge. As shown in Figure 1, concurrent assessments of daily hassles and script knowledge indicated moderate positive associations at Waves 3 and Waves 4 (β = .26, p = .001 and .23, p = .05, respectively). Additionally, a small negative association was found between daily hassles at Wave 2 and script knowledge at Wave 3 (β = -.15, p = .05).
These findings highlight the developmental importance of stress in predicting change in secure base script knowledge during middle childhood. Given that severely stressful events occur infrequently and often offer no clear solution (e.g., death or loss), these results may reflect a learning phenomenon in which more opportunities to successfully practice secure base use and support lead to greater knowledge of the secure base script. These findings hold significant implications for attachment theory, with a particular focus on characteristics of stress that may influence script development.

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