Differences in attachment security between African-American and white children: ethnicity or socio-economic status?

Infant Behavior & Development 27 (2004) 417–433

Differences in attachment security between African-American and white children: ethnicity or socio-economic status? Marian J. Bakermans-Kranenburg∗ , Marinus H. van IJzendoorn, Pieter M. Kroonenberg Center for Child and Family Studies, Department of Education and Child Studies, Leiden University, Wassenaarseweg 52, 2333 AK Leiden, The Netherlands Received 12 December 2003; received in revised form 27 January 2004; accepted 4 February 2004

Abstract The NICHD Early Childcare Research Network data set was used to examine differences in attachment security between African-American children (n = 142) and white children (n = 1002). African-American children’s mean score on the Attachment Q-sort (AQS) [Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development 60 (1995) 234] was substantially lower (.20) than that of white children’s (.30). The pattern of covariation between attachment security and predictor variables was similar in the African-American and white subgroups. In both groups, maternal sensitivity was the strongest predictor of attachment security. A mediational model explaining the difference in attachment security included income and sensitivity: African-American ethnicity was related to low income which through (in-)sensitivity affected the quality of the infant–mother attachment relationship (family stress model). Our findings on African-American mother–infant dyads support one of the basic tenets of attachment theory: the association between maternal sensitivity and attachment security. Children of African-American and white families in the USA may be exposed to culturally specific experiences, but these do not alter the relation between attachment security and pertinent predictor variables. Poverty may, however, seriously hamper maternal sensitivity. © 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: African-American; Attachment; Attachment Q-sort; Ethnicity; Cross-cultural; Socio-economic status

∗

Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (M.J. Bakermans-Kranenburg).

0163-6383/$ – see front matter © 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.infbeh.2004.02.002

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1. Introduction Already in the first few years after birth, large differences between African-American and white children have emerged in various domains of development (Garcia Coll, 1990; McLoyd, 1990a, 1998; Spencer, 1990). In this paper we focus on differences in attachment security. Attachment is conceptualized as the emotional bond or tie of infants to their parents, and attachment theory has become a major source of hypotheses for research on the socio-emotional development of young children (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978; Bowlby, 1969). Central questions in this paper are whether African-American and white children differ in attachment security; and – when such differences exist – how they can be explained. Are differences in attachment security the result of factors that are associated with ethnicity, or should they be ascribed to socio-economic circumstances? Differences in attachment security between African-American and white children may result from three separate processes. First, attachment measures may be culturally biased and yield unwarrantedly low scores for security in cultural groups different from the culture in which the measures were developed. Second, associations between attachment quality and assumed precursors of secure attachment may be divergent in different cultural contexts, i.e. in African-American and white families. And lastly, a third variable, related to ethnicity and attachment, may be responsible for differences in attachment security between the two groups. Considering the first hypothesis, it must be noted that attachment researchers have been blamed of having an ethnocentric bias. Their measures of sensitivity and attachment security would be biased toward Western ways of thinking, and would result in lower rates of children that are considered secure in other ethnic or cultural groups (Rothbaum, Weisz, Pott, Miyake, & Morelli, 2000). Evidence supporting this argument is, however, weak. First, as Van IJzendoorn and Sagi (1999) have shown in their review, cross-cultural attachment research has demonstrated the normativity of secure attachment in diverse cultures. Intra-cultural differences in the development of attachment appear larger than cross-cultural differences, and departures from the numerical normativity of secure attachment may be the result of incorrect application of the assessment procedure. For instance, when Strange Situation separations are not curtailed when infants are distressed for more than 20 s, the procedure is more than mildly stressful; and that may constitute a plausible explanation of the overrepresentation of insecure-resistant infants in one Japanese sample (Miyake, Chen, & Campos, 1985; see Van IJzendoorn & Sagi, 2001). Using the Attachment Q-sort (AQS; Waters, 1995) in a cross-cultural study, Posada et al. (1995) did not find greater similarity of Q-sort profiles within each of seven socio-cultural groups than between the groups. Moreover, mothers’ description of their most ideal child in different cultures turned out to be similar to the expert’s description of a prototypical securely attached child (Posada et al., 1995; Vereijken, 1996). In sum, there is insufficient evidence to ascribe differences in attachment security between African-American and white children to biased measures of attachment. The second explanation of differences in developmental outcomes between African-American and white children pertains to the existence of diverging developmental processes in different cultural groups. Two competing hypotheses can be distinguished (Rowe, Vazsony, & Flannery, 1994). The no group difference hypothesis is that there are few, if any, differences among ethnic groups in most developmental processes (where evidence for such processes can be found in the patterns of covariation among relevant variables). According to this hypothesis, members of a society of different ethnic origins are exposed to variables common to all ethnic groups in that society. Culturally specific experiences do not alter the associations among developmental variables. This hypothesis allows for main effect differences in

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variables but states that the correlations among variables do not differ between groups. In contrast, the group differences hypothesis presupposes culturally relative models of socialization (Garcia Coll, 1990; Ogbu, 1981, 1993) and it states that correlations among developmental variables are different between groups. According to this model, development occurs within cultural contexts that are associated with qualitatively different processes. Any observed differences in developmental processes are assumed to be adaptive responses to the demands of the cultural environment (Ogbu, 1981). Some studies on the effects of parental discipline have provided evidence for the group differences hypothesis: Authoritarian parenting (a restrictive, often physical parenting style) was found to be associated with negative socioemotional outcomes for European-American children in preschool or school age, but not for AfricanAmerican children (Baumrind, 1972, 1993; Deater-Deckard, Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 1996; Dornbusch, Ritter, Leiderman, Roberts, & Fraleigh, 1987). Cross-cultural studies on attachment have presented some evidence for the universality of the hypothesized association between parental sensitivity and attachment security in different cultures (the no group difference hypothesis), but not in all studies this association was found (Van IJzendoorn & Sagi, 1999). Because the meta-analytic association between attachment and sensitivity is only modest (r = .24, De Wolff & Van IJzendoorn, 1997), lack of statistical power may have prevented unequivocal decisions about observed associations between sensitivity and attachment in small samples (the majority of the studies across different cultures included less than 40 families). Alternatively, correlations among the pertinent variables may differ between groups (the group differences hypothesis), and divergent associations between attachment and sensitivity (or other precursors) may be found for African-American and white families. For instance, Jackson (1993) considered multiple caregiving as instantiated in African-American families as distinctive and without parallel in the cross-cultural literature on attachment. Child care for African-American children is generally conducted within a relatively large social network of friends and acquaintances of the family. There are often several adult caregivers with designated responsibility for infant care and a larger set of children and adults who also provide care. In Jackson’s (1991) study,the number of households providing daily care for any one child ranged from 1 to 4; and the infants encountered on average 15 familiar adults on a recurring weekly basis. This seems to imply a context for the infant–mother attachment formation that is rather different from the experiences of most white American infants. The third explanation of different developmental outcomes assumes that the patterns of covariation among relevant variables are similar in the different ethnic or cultural groups, but that a ‘third variable’ on which the groups differ is responsible for differences in outcome. The first candidate for such an explanatory factor distinguishing African-American and white children in the USA may be socio-economic status. African-American children generally come from families with lower incomes and a lower educational level of the parents than white children. Thus, diverging child outcomes among families with different ethnicities may as a matter of fact be caused by differences in family income (Jencks & Philips, 1998). Family income is associated with the development of children and youth (Huston, McLoyd, & Garcia Coll, 1994). Studies based on the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-Child Supplement (NLSY-CS), Infant Health Development Program, and the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) have shown that income effects are strongest during the preschool and early school years (Duncan, Brooks-Gunn, & Klebanov, 1994; Duncan, Yeung, Brooks-Gunn, & Smith, 1998). This early childhood effect has been found to be particularly strong when low income is persistent. Income may have a differential effect on distinct child outcomes. Stronger effects of adverse economic conditions have been found on children’s school and cognitive achievement than on children’s socio-

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emotional development (Duncan & Brooks-Gunn, 1997; Haveman & Wolfe, 1994). Nevertheless, Linver, Brooks-Gunn, and Kohen (2002) demonstrated that child behavior problems were associated with low family income. Two processes were responsible this association. First, low income was related to child behavior problems via maternal emotional distress, which was related to observed parenting practices. This mediational model is known as the family stress model. The family stress model postulates that low income influences children’s development (measured in terms of school achievement, school engagement, or behavior problems) because of its impact on parent mental health, which then influences parenting practices, which in turn are associated with children and youth outcomes (Conger et al., 1992, 1993; Elder & Caspi, 1988; McLoyd, 1989). Empirical studies have demonstrated that economic hardship diminishes parental abilities to provide warm, responsive parenting (Dodge, Pettit, & Bates, 1994) and contributes to an increase in the use of harsh punishment (Dodge et al., 1994; McLoyd, Jayaratne, Ceballo, & Borquez, 1994; Smith & Brook-Gunn, 1997). A second model, known as the investment model, hypothesizes that income is associated with child development because it enables parents to purchase materials, experiences, and services that are beneficial to children’s well-being and development (Becker & Thomes, 1986; Haveman & Wolfe, 1994; Mayer, 1997). Studies on attachment have shown a high incidence of insecurity in poor families where poverty is combined with other social risks such as social isolation, maternal depression, or inadequate caretaking (e.g., Barnard et al., 1988; Lyons-Ruth, Connell, and Grunebaum, 1990). In a meta-analysis of infant attachment (Van IJzendoorn, Goldberg, Kroonenberg, & Frenkel, 1992) the distribution of classifications in low-SES samples was not contrasted with the distribution of middle-class samples, but in a metaanalysis of adult attachment, secure representations of attachment were underrepresented in low-SES samples (Van IJzendoorn & Bakermans-Kranenburg, 1996). Research on attachment in African-American children involved, apparently without exception, only low-income families (Sims-Stanford, 1997; Nelson, 1991), which is not surprising as African-American ethnicity and low income tend to go together. In sum, the focus of our research is whether African-American and white children differ in attachment security; and – when such a difference exist – whether differences in attachment security can be explained by patterns of covariation that are either associated with ethnicity, or with socio-economic differences. Our database is the NICHD Study of Early Child Care (see NICHD, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2002, 2003b). The NICHD study covers a large, more or less representative sample of US children (N = 1364 children) who were recruited at ten different sites in the USA (see Section 2). About 13% of these children had mothers who were African-American, and about 83% had white mothers. The children were followed across the first seven years of their lives, and their development was monitored at regular intervals. Attachment was assessed with the Attachment Q-sort (Waters, 1995). The AQS consists of 90 specific behavioral descriptions of 12–48-month-old children in the natural home-setting, with special emphasis on secure-base behavior (Vaughn & Waters, 1990). Waters and Deane (1985) introduced the AQS for assessing attachment security in infants and toddlers as an alternative to the Strange Situation laboratory procedure (SSP, Ainsworth et al., 1978), and it appears to have some advantages over the SSP (see Van IJzendoorn, Vereijken, Bakermans-Kranenburg, & Riksen-Walraven, in press). For the current study, it is of relevance that AQS observations are conducted in the home, and they may therefore have higher ecological validity. The SSP has been criticized for its lack of ecological validity (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). Furthermore, because the application of the AQS does not require the stressful separations used in the SSP, the method can be applied in cultures and populations in which parent–infant separations may be less common (e.g., Kazui, Endo, Tanaka, Sakagami, & Suganuma, 2000). We therefore use the AQS (at

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24 months of the children’s age) to explore differences in attachment between the two ethnic groups. We include ratings of maternal sensitivity during the first two years as well as relevant background variables.

2. Method 2.1. Participants Participants in the NICHD Study of Early Child Care were recruited from 10 sites around the USA throughout 1991. From among 8986 mothers giving birth during selected 24-h sampling periods, potential participants were screened to determine their eligibility for the study. Subjects were excluded from the sample if (a) the mother was under 18, (b) the mother was not conversant in English, (c) the family was planning to move, (d) the child was hospitalized for more than 7 days following birth or had obvious disabilities, (e) the mother had a known or an acknowledged substance-abuse problem, or (f) the family lived at a considerable distance from the site or in a location that posed a danger to home visitors. A total of 1525 families were considered eligible for inclusion in the study and agreed to be interviewed; of these, 1364 families with healthy newborns were enrolled in the study. An overview of the data collection procedures is given in NICHD Early Child Care Research Network (1999). The recruited families came from a wide range of socio-economic and socio-cultural backgrounds and included 24% ethnic-minority children, 11% low-education mothers (less than a high school education), and 14% single-parent mothers. (Note that these percentages are not mutually exclusive.) Average family income was 3.6 times the poverty threshold. The final participants differed from the children who were recruited but were lost to follow-up in the following ways. Mothers of participants had statistically significantly (P < .05) more education (M = 14.4 years and S.D. = 2.5 versus M = 13.6 years and S.D. = 2.6); higher family incomes (income/poverty ratio: M = 3.6 and S.D. = 2.8 versus M = 3.2 and S.D. = 3.1); and were more likely to have a husband or partner in the household (85% versus 76%). The children were less likely to be African-American (11% versus 19%; NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 1999). The sample was not designed to be representative of the USA, but demographic characteristics of the sample were compared with those of people living in the same US census tracts. The sample was similar to families in the census tract records and in the USA as a whole on household income and ethnicity. A preliminary examination of the ethnic background of the families showed that only 63 mothers were not either African-American or white. Therefore, we decided to limit our study to families with either an African-American or a white mother. For 1144 families (n = 142 African-American mothers, n = 1002 white mothers) data on maternal sensitivity and infant–mother attachment security as assessed with the Attachment Q-sort at 24 months was available. 2.2. Measures Details of the measurement instruments and the data collection can be found in the “Phase I Instrument Document” of the NICHD Study of Early Child Care (1999). In the NICHD project many composite variables were constructed from more elementary questionnaires, interviews and observations. In the current study these composite variables were used, along with the raw AQS data (see also NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 1999).

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2.2.1. Attachment security At 24 months after birth, attachment security was assessed at home with the Attachment Q-set (Vaughn & Waters, 1990; Waters, 1995; Waters & Deane, 1985). The AQS consists of 90 cards with behavioral descriptions that observers sorted into fixed piles from ‘least descriptive’ (1) to ‘most descriptive’ (9) of the child after a 2-h home visit. The resulting profile was correlated with the profile of a prototypically secure child as determined by experts in the field (Waters & Deane, 1985), and the correlation constituted the child’s security score. Intercoder reliabilities averaged .73 across all research assistants at all sites, and security scores differed on average .06. 2.2.2. Sensitivity Maternal sensitivity to the child’s signals was assessed from videotapes of about 15 minutes of free play between mother and child at 6 and 15 months (at home), and at 24 months (in the lab). In the first half of the session the mothers were asked to play as usual, using toys of their own choosing. The second half of the session the mothers were asked to play with a standard set of toys. After training coders to satisfactory intercoder reliabilities, a set of 4-point global rating scales were used for various dimensions of mother–child interactions, and a sensitivity composite was computed. We aggregated the sensitivity assessments at 6, 15, and 24 months into an overall sensitivity score because maternal sensitivity appeared to be stable across time. Alpha reliability of the composite was .62. 2.2.3. Child care NICHD collected detailed data on child care (NICHD, 2000, 2002, 2003a). Approximately every 3 months (i.e., at 1, 3, 6, 9, etc.) mothers were asked about the current child-care arrangements for their children. We computed the average number of hours of non-maternal childcare per week in the first two years of the infant’s life. 2.2.4. Maternal and family characteristics We included maternal age at child’s birth and birth order of the child as background variables. Income was operationalized as total family income per year during the first three years. Because the distribution of income was (positively) skewed, we used the log transformation of the values in subsequent analyses (Tabachnik & Fidell, 2001, p. 83). Means were calculated from the available data and used to replace missing values in the background variables prior to analysis (Tabachnik & Fidell, 2001, p. 62).

3. Results 3.1. What are the similarities and differences between African-American and white families? In Table 1 means and standard deviations of socio-economic, child rearing, and developmental variables for the African-American and white families are presented. From this table it can be derived that in almost all respects the African-American and white families differ considerably. African-American mothers (M = 24.68, S.D. = 5.38) were on average almost four years younger than the white mothers (M = 28.98, S.D. = 5.38) in our sample, and the African-American children included in the sample had a statistically significantly higher birth order (M = 2.07, S.D. = 1.12) than the white children (M = 1.78, S.D. = 0.86). Income in the African-American families (M = 26.50, S.D. = 19.67) was almost half of the income of

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Table 1 Descriptives of background variables, maternal sensitivity, and attachment security

Mother’s age at 1 month Child’s birth order Average hours child care per week during 1–3 years Total income in thousands of dollars 1+ 2 + 3 years Total maternal sensitivity rating, 1 + 2 years AQS security score at 24 months

African-Americana

Whiteb

Mean

S.D.

Mean

S.D.

Mean

S.D.

24.64 2.07 24.17

5.38 1.12 15.74

28.98 1.78 22.77

5.38 0.86 15.91

28.44 1.82 22.94

26.50

19.67

53.76

37.34

7.86

1.41

9.53

.20

.18

.30

Total

t (d.f.)

P

5.57 0.90 15.89

9.00 (1142) 2.95 (165.53)c 0.99 (1142)

<.01 <.01 .33

50.37

36.74

13.43 (310.32)c

<.01

1.20

9.32

1.35

13.36 (170.74)c

<.01

.21

.29

.21

5.54 (1142)

<.01

Bold values indicate the higher mean in the African-American vs. white comparison. a n = 142. b n = 1002. c Unequal variances.

the white families (M = 53.76, S.D. = 37.34). Only average hours of non-maternal child care in AfricanAmerican families (M = 24.17, S.D. = 15.74) did not differ from hours of child care in white families (M = 22.77, S.D. = 15.91). African-American and white mothers differed also statistically significantly in terms of sensitive parenting. African-American mothers showed less sensitive responsiveness in the first two years of the child’s life (M = 7.86, S.D. = 1.42) than white mothers (M = 9.53, S.D. = 1.20). African-American children’s attachment security at two years after birth was substantially lower than in white children, with means of .20 (S.D. = .18) for African-American children’s attachment security, and .30 (S.D. = .21) for white children’s attachment security. The score of .20 for the African-American children is substantially lower than the average observer AQS security score for infant–mother attachment in non-clinical samples of .32 (Van IJzendoorn et al., in press). In fact, it is closer to the mean score of .21 that was found for children in clinical samples (Van IJzendoorn et al., in press). In order to outline the specific differences in behavior between the two ethnic groups, Table 2 presents the AQS items that differed significantly between the two groups. Many items with high loadings on the AQS Security Criterion, such as ‘uses mother as base from which to explore’ and ‘enjoys relaxing in mother’s lap’ showed statistically significant differences. The African-American children scored less secure on these attachment items. However, several not-attachment-related items also yielded statistically significantly different scores. A set of items indicating children’s compliance showed consistently lower mean scores for the AfricanAmerican group. African-American children appeared to be less compliant to their mothers’ suggestions or requests, and were less inclined to ‘stop misbehavior when told no’. African-American children showed on average also more active and even rough behavior in the context of play. Play materials were more roughly handled and the children became more easily angry with toys. But African-American children were also more inclined to enjoy ‘dancing and singing along with music’, and – maybe in absence of an abundance of toys – they tended to spend more time playing with just a few favorite toys. Moreover, the African-American children were more sociable to strangers visiting their home. They enjoyed climbing all over visitors, getting their hugs, and were in general more oriented toward the stranger.

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Table 2 Attachment Q-sort items with significantly different means for African-American and white children African-Americana M S.D.

Whiteb M

S.D.

Attachment 54. Expects M to be interfering 60. Less afraid if M says it’s ok 53. Arms around M when picked up 36. Uses M as base from which to explore 83. Bored-goes to M for something to do 74. Acts like M no comply if M delay 14. Finds new toy-brings to/shows M 71. Afraid/upset-stops cry if hold by M 33. Wants down-fusses-wants back up 21. Keeps track of M when playing 28. Enjoys relaxing in M’s lap 26. Cries when left with babysitter 69. Rarely asks M for help 70. Greets M spontaneously

4.55 4.54 5.62 4.73 4.09 5.11 4.51 5.32 4.34 5.42 5.59 4.92 5.20 4.20

2.28 0.87 1.36 2.20 1.35 1.84 1.73 1.26 1.06 1.79 2.59 0.88 1.91 1.14

3.21 4.93 6.15 5.42 4.43 4.58 4.90 5.59 4.08 5.82 6.07 4.75 4.65 4.40

2.06 0.70 1.49 2.15 1.23 2.03 1.49 1.11 1.15 1.90 2.26 .824 2.08 1.05

.000 .000 .000 .000 .003 .003 .005 .009 .011 .016 .020 .028 .033 .033

Compliance 01. Readily shares or shares if M asks 24. Sorry/ashamed if M speaks firmly 18. Follows suggestions M readily 41. Follows when M says to do so 32. Stops misbehavior when told no 77. Understands what M wants child to do 84. Effort to be tidy around the house 31. Wants to be center attention M

5.63 3.69 5.66 5.61 3.87 6.61 4.56 3.48

2.02 1.75 2.08 1.35 2.13 1.36 1.88 2.08

6.62 4.24 6.35 6.04 4.34 6.93 4.96 3.91

1.73 1.38 2.08 1.45 1.98 1.41 1.79 2.28

.000 .000 .000 .001 .009 .009 .014 .035

Activity level 68. Child is more active than M 82. Most play time with few favorite toys 45. Enjoys dancing or singing with music 04. Careful and gentle with toys 30. Easily becomes angry with toys 61. Plays roughly with M-bumps, scratches

6.57 5.09 6.75 4.01 3.91 5.36

1.43 2.48 1.35 1.98 1.38 1.31

5.94 4.06 6.18 4.67 3.48 4.98

1.30 2.25 1.35 2.05 1.56 1.45

.000 .000 .000 .000 .002 .003

Sociability 51. Enjoys climbing all over visitors 78. Enjoys hugs from adults other than M 72. Repeats activity if visitors laugh 58. Ignores adults who visit home 17. Loses interest in new adults who annoy

5.13 5.73 5.55 3.15 4.25

1.93 1.48 1.46 2.43 1.16

4.31 5.25 5.25 3.63 4.44

1.76 1.26 1.39 2.34 1.02

.000 .000 .016 .026 .042

Transitional object 73. Has a cuddly toy/security blanket

4.95

1.59

5.48

1.72

.001

Bold values indicate the higher mean in the African-American vs. white comparison. a n = 142. b n = 1002.

Sign (P)

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Table 3 Correlations between attachment security and predictor variables

Predictor Race Mother’s age Child’s birth order Child care Incomed Maternal sensitivity ∗ ∗∗ a b c d

African-Americana

Whiteb

Totalc

.21∗ .04 .08 .15 .20∗

.12∗∗ .01 −.01 .17∗∗ .23∗∗

.16∗∗ .17∗∗ −.00 −.01 .21∗∗ .27∗∗

P < .05. P < .01. n = 142. n = 1002. N = 1144. Logarithmic transformation.

Lastly, African-American children were less often attached to a cuddly toy or a security blanket (see Table 2). 3.2. Associations with background variables In Table 3 the bivariate correlations between background variables and attachment security are presented, for the total group as well as for the African-American and white families separately. Older mothers had children with more attachment security, in the total group as well as in African-American and white families separately. In the total group (r = .21) as well as in white families separately (r = .17), higher income was associated with more attachment security. In African-American families, the association between income and attachment security (r = .15) was comparable in size, but not statistically significant. Hours of non-maternal child care and the child’s birth order were not associated with the children’s attachment security. Lastly, sensitive parenting was associated with attachment security in the total group (r = .27) as well as in the separate groups of African-American (r = .20) and white families (r = .23). 3.3. The role of ethnicity in predicting attachment security: a multivariate perspective To examine the role of race in predicting attachment security, multivariate hierarchical regressions were conducted for the African-American and white families separately with attachment security as criterion, and sensitivity, maternal age, and income as predictors. In a multivariate hierarchical regression for the total group, race was included after the combination of sensitivity and background variables. In Table 4 the results of these regressions are presented. Table 4 shows that for both the African-American and white families separately only the first step of the hierarchical regression was statistically significant, and that in the total group ethnicity did not add significantly to the prediction of attachment security when sensitivity, income, and age were taken into account. In Table 5 the beta weights of the pertinent predictors are presented, both for the African-American and white families separately and for the total group. The table shows that – although the income factor in African-American families was not statistically significant

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Table 4 Summary of hierarchical regression analysis for variables predicting attachment security Ra

Rb

Pchange

Step 1: Sensitivity African-Americana Whiteb Totalc

.20 .23 .27

.04 .05 .07

.02 <.01 <.01

Step 2: Incomed , age African-Americana Whiteb Totalc

.26 .25 .29

.07 .06 .08

.14 .03 <.01

Step3: Ethnicity Totalc

.29

.08

.17

a b c d

n = 142. n = 1002. N = 1144. Logarithmic transformation.

Table 5 Beta weights for variables predicting attachment security Afro-Americana

Whiteb

Totalc

Beta weights Sensitivity Incomed

.17 .11

.19 .09

.22 .10

P-values Sensitivity Incomed

.04 .22

<.01 .01

<.01 <.01

Multiple correlations R

.23

.24

.29

a b c d

n = 142. n = 1002. N = 1144. Logarithmic transformation.

– the beta weights for African-American and white families are comparable in size. Fig. 1 shows that in both plots the regression lines of the ethnic groups are virtually parallel, and that the point clouds for African-Americans lie at the lower left of those of the whites, illustrating that although the means of the groups are different, the correlation between the variables are not. 3.3.1. Cross-validation In order to test whether the African-American and white participants would show similar fit of the regression model, the regression equations including sensitivity, maternal age, and income were crossvalidated in the other group. The equation for African-Americans, which had a multiple correlation of .26,

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Fig. 1. Security with sensitivity (left) and security with income (logarithmic transformed) partitioned by ethnicity.

showed a cross-validation correlation for whites of .17. On the other hand, the equation for whites, which had a multiple correlation of .25, showed a cross-validation correlation for African-Americans of .23. Thus the white equation cross-validated without shrinkage, whereas the equation for African-Americans showed a lower cross-validating correlation (.09 lower). The difference could be expected considering the smaller sample size for the African-Americans, which makes the estimates less precise. 3.3.2. Stability of estimated scores To investigate the sensitivity of the predicted scores with respect to the exact form of the regression equation, the estimated scores for the criterion variable from both regression equations were correlated within a group. The correlation between the two estimates within the African-American group was r = .85 (n = 142), and within the white group r = .73 (n = 1002). Thus, the predicted scores from both regression models appeared to be largely similar within the groups. When examining the predictive power of the two equations in each of the groups, it can be noted that they were predicting attachment security in the African-American and white sub-samples in a similar manner (R = .26 and R = .23 for African-Americans and R = .17 and R = .25 for whites). As the difference between the cross-validation correlations and the multiple correlations within the groups was below .10, the equations were largely the same and the shrinkage is probably due to overfitting of the regression equation to its own sample rather than an inappropriateness of the equation from the other group. 3.4. Predicting attachment security: mediational model In order to examine whether African-American children had lower AQS security scores due to the family stress model (low income influences child development through its impact on parenting), we tested

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Fig. 2. Mediational model.

whether the association between attachment security and income was mediated by maternal sensitivity. Empirical support for mediation requires four steps (Baron & Kenny, 1986): (1) income significantly predicts sensitivity, (2) income significantly predicts attachment security, (3) sensitivity significantly predicts attachment security and (4) once sensitivity is added to the equation, the prediction between income and attachment is no longer statistically significant. For step 1, income was indeed significantly associated with maternal sensitivity (r = .48, P < .01). Income was also significantly related to AQS attachment security (step 2), r = .21, P < .01. Step 3 pertains to the association between maternal sensitivity and AQS attachment security. As noted above (see Table 2), maternal sensitivity was significantly associated with attachment security, r = .27 (P < .01). Finally, to accomplish step 4, a stepwise hierarchical regression analysis was conducted in which maternal sensitivity was entered first and income was entered second. The regression weight between income and attachment security dropped from β = .21 to β = .10 (P < .01), whereas the prediction of attachment security from maternal sensitivity was now β = .22 (P < .01). Thus, the association between income and attachment security was partially mediated by maternal sensitivity (see Fig. 2). In order to control for the influence of maternal age, we matched each African-American mother at random with a white mother of the same age. In this subsample of n = 284 mothers (half of them AfricanAmerican, half of them white) there was complete mediation (Baron & Kenny, 1986): The statistically significant regression weight between income and attachment security (β = .20, P < .01) dropped to a nonsignificant level (β = .11, ns) after controlling for sensitivity, whereas the prediction of attachment security from maternal sensitivity remained significant (β = .22, P < .01). 3.5. Income and ethnicity The distributions of income in the African-American and white families differed substantially. Higher incomes were only found in white families, and the variances in the two groups were unequal. The effect size for the difference in income was computed on the basis of the t-value (unequal variances) and amounted to r = .65. The strong relation between ethnicity and income was added to the model in Fig. 2, showing how ethnicity is related to income, which through sensitivity affects the quality of the infant–mother attachment relationship.

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4. Discussion The extensive data set of the NICHD Early Childcare Research Network was used to examine differences in attachment security between African-American and white children at two years of age. African-American children’s attachment security was substantially lower than in white children. In fact, their mean score of .20 was similar to the meta-analytical average of .21 for children in clinical samples (Van IJzendoorn et al., in press). The African-American children did not only show less secure base behavior, but also less compliance, a higher activity level, and they were more sociable with strangers. As compliance has been demonstrated to be related to attachment security (e.g., Londerville & Main, 1981), most of the behavioral differences (65%) observed through the AQS at home are directly or indirectly indexing attachment. Activity level and sociability may be associated with temperamental differences that are unrelated to attachment security (Vaughn & Bost, 1999). Our findings converge with the high sociability of African-American children reported by Jackson (1983, 1991), who notes that in the African-American culture friendliness with unfamiliar people is usually encouraged. In spite of diverging ethnic group characteristics in attachment, activity and sociability, we found that the pattern of covariation between attachment security and predictor variables was similar in the African-American and white subgroups. In both groups, maternal sensitivity was the strongest predictor of attachment security. The regression equations of the African-American and white subgroups predicted attachment security in the two sub-samples in a largely similar manner, and in the total group ethnicity did not add significantly to the prediction of attachment security. Our findings provide support for the no group difference hypothesis: Children of African-American and white families in the USA may be exposed to culturally specific experiences, but these do not alter the relation between attachment security and pertinent predictor variables. The findings converge with recent evidence from attachment research in non-Western cultures. For example, Zevalkink, Riksen-Walraven, and Van Lieshout (1999) found that Sundanese-Indonesian mother–infant dyads from low SES backgrounds showed the expected association between quality of maternal support and sensitivity, and the infant’s attachment security as assessed with the Strange Situation Procedure. In a recent study in Japan, Kazui, Endo, Tanaka, Sakagami, and Suganuma (2000) confirmed the expected association between security of maternal attachment representations as assessed with the Adult Attachment Interview, and their infants’ attachment security as established with the observer AQS. In a study on the consequences of HIV infection in Ugandan mothers, Peterson, Drotar, Olness, Guay, and Kiziri-Mayengo (2001) found that maternal support and sensitivity as observed in the home was strongly associated with AQS security scores of the infants in this low-income sample. In South-Africa, Tomlinson (2002) studied postnatal depression in black mothers and its influence on their infants in an impoverished peri-urban settlement. Although postnatal depression was much more frequent in these difficult life-circumstances, it was predictably related to security of attachment in the infants. Our findings on African-American mother–infant dyads support one of the basic tenets of attachment theory: The association between maternal sensitivity and attachment security. Observational and experimental studies of attachment have broadly confirmed the idea that sensitive responsiveness to a child’s attachment signals is causally related to security, and De Wolff and van IJzendoorn (1997) have documented a modest but robust mean effect size of r = .24. Socioeconomic status was a significant moderator in their meta-analysis: in the 18 middle-class samples, the effect size was .27, whereas in the eight lower-

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class samples this figure was .15. De Wolff and Van IJzendoorn suggested that the strains and stresses of lower-class life may overburden potentially sensitive mothers. This may be the case, but it should be noted that in our study the association between sensitivity and attachment security for African-Americans (.20) was similar to that of white families (.23). Indeed, African-American mothers were less sensitive to their children’s signals than white mothers; and the effect size for the difference was substantial, d = 1.27. Why are children from African-American mothers less secure than children from white mothers? Our mediational model provides evidence for the explanation that includes income and sensitivity as intermediate variables. The negative effects of economic hardship on children’s developmental outcomes are well documented (Haveman, Wolfe, & Spaulding, 1991; Huston et al., 1994; Jencks & Philips, 1998; Keating & Hertzman, 1999). The family stress model, postulating that low income influences children’s development through its impact on parenting practices, which in turn are associated with children and youth outcomes (Conger et al., 1992, 1993) seems to describe adequately what is going on in African-American families. Income effects are strongest when low income is persistent, or when poverty is deep. Exactly these characteristics are typical of African-American families: poverty among African-American children is marked by its persistence and geographic concentration, whereas it is primarily a transitory, geographically diffuse phenomenon among white children (McLoyd, 1990b). It should be noted that we found only partial mediation: The path via maternal (in-)sensitivity only partially accounts for the association between income and attachment security. Explanations for the remaining association between income and attachment security should be found in the behavioral domain, with direct impact on the child’s socio-emotional development. Although the NICHD study includes many maternal attitudinal and personality variables, the number of maternal behavioral variables is relatively small. Pertinent behavioral variables on the level of the child’s experiences in daily interactions with the parent, which from the perspective of attachment research would be obvious candidates to test complementary explanations, are lacking. Interestingly, in the mediational analysis on the subgroup matched for maternal age, we found complete mediation for the same model. In sum, the findings of the current investigation document that attachment security is not a white, middle-class American phenomenon that discriminates against non-Western or non-white cultures and ethnicities. In fact, the first empirical attachment study was conducted in Uganda some fifty years ago (Ainsworth, 1967). At the same time, however, our study demonstrates that it is important to acknowledge that the development of attachment is not immune against contextual influences. In that respect, our findings converge with results from a recent Israeli study demonstrating that low quality non-maternal care imposes ecological constraints on infant–mother attachment formation (Aviezer, Sagi-Schwartz, & Koren-Karie, 2003). In a similar vein, low income may force mothers to become less sensitive to their infants than their cultural or ethnic background might allow them to be in optimal circumstances. This is in line with the conclusion of Zevalkink and Riksen-Walraven (2001) from their comparative study on Dutch, Surinamese-Dutch, Japanese, and Sundanese-Indonesian mother–infant dyads, that socioeconomic factors have a stronger impact on the quality of parenting than cultural factors. In Belsky’s process model of child development (Belsky, 1984) socio-economic influences are incorporated without the implication that child rearing and child development are completely culturedependent and would fail to show universal, evolutionary based characteristics (Belsky, 1999). In research on child development the role of culture and ethnicity should not be confused with the influences of poverty.

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Acknowledgements This study was conducted by the NICHD Early Child Care Research Network supported by NICHD through a cooperative agreement that calls for scientific collaboration between the grantees and NICHD staff. The authors acknowledge the generous way in which the NICHD Study on Early Child Care has made this unique data set available for further secondary analyses. They are grateful to Mari¨elle Linting and Patrick Groenen for their assistance in the data preparation and their contributions to our discussions about the research potentials of the NICHD data set.

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