Book Review
Attachment Theory 
Attachment From Infancy to Adulthood:
The Major Longitudinal Studies Klaus E Grossman, Karin Grossman, Everett Waters, editors. New York (NY): Guilford Press; 2005. 332 p. US$40.00.
Reviewer
rating*: Excellent
Review by: Magdalena Janus, PhD
Hamilton, Ontario
When a new scientific text lands on one’s desk, a book whose contributors are authorities on the subject, one expects a certain level of enjoyment from reading it. However, to find such a book a delight to read is indeed rare. Nevertheless, this new text on attachment is a delight.
This is no ordinary review of longitudinal studies on attachment, some of which lasted long enough for children who contributed data while babies to have babies of their own. The way the 11 chapters, each by a leading authority on an aspect of attachment theory, are laid out is probably the secret to the ease with which the book is read. Each chapter starts with a biographical, highly individual account of how the authors found themselves interested and involved in the study of attachment. This provides insight into the minds and lives of these prominent researchers and a realistic perspective on the shaping of careers. The authors then continue to describe their lives’ work in the field of attachment in an accessible, almost storytelling manner.
The book opens with a chapter by Robert Hinde that illuminates the role of ethology in the development of John Bowlby’s ideas. It is a beautifully told, fascinating piece of history comparable to an account of how Darwin’s theory came together and yet likely unfamiliar to most of the current generation of attachment researchers. This is followed by Inge Bretherton’s account of how the development of the construct of the internal working model is played out in attachment theory and research.
The following 4 chapters deal with child development within and without family contexts. The chapter by L Alan Sroufe, Byron Egeland, Elizabeth Carlson, and W Andrew Collins tells how the longitudinal Minnesota Study of Risk and Adaptation From Birth to Adulthood contributed to the understanding of how events of later childhood and adolescence modify the impact of early attachment on later outcomes. This chapter ends with 2 elegant case stories that go a long way in demystifying the protective and risk factors early attachments may impose on long-term outcomes. Jay Belsky describes attachment research from an ecologic perspective, including nonmaternal care, and concludes by promoting a modern evolutionary view of attachment as a psychological mechanism sensitive to the caregiving conditions and with consequences for reproductive choices. Karin and Klaus E Grossmann with Heinz Kindler summarize 20 years of research on mother–infant bonds and their impact on later relationships in 2 longitudinal German studies. This is perhaps the only non-North American account in such depth that shows many similarities and also subtle differences.
The 5 preceding chapters pay more attention to the intergenerational transmission and representations of attachment. Howard and Miriam Steele focus on understanding emotional development in relationships with both parents according to the intertwining foundation of attachment and psychoanalytic theory. Avi Sagi-Schwartz and Ora Aviezer explore how a disturbance of a simple environmental system can affect aspects of relationships and attachments among children who grow up in kibbutzim with multiple care providers. Joan Stevenson-Hinde argues convincingly that parental influence is stronger than that of the child in shaping the parent–infant bond. Judith Crowell and Everett Waters describe the relevance of attachment constructs to couple or marital functioning, particularly in transition to parenthood. Perhaps fittingly, the longest chapter in the book, a detailed and fascinating account of the longitudinal findings from Mary Ainsworth’s original Berkeley sample, is written by Mary Main, Erik Hesse, and Nancy Kaplan.
In a closing chapter, Mary Dozier, Melissa Manni, and Oliver Lindhiem touch on some of the controversial issues, including the perception of the guildlike quality of the group of researchers studying attachment. They also argue that, with the wealth of data available on normative samples, it is time to use the attachment perspective to inform research as well as practice with atypical populations: foster children and maltreated or neglected children. Dozier and others suggest that attachment theory has a lot to contribute to intervention frameworks where parental care has been disrupted.
There are several places where this book is of particular interest to a psychiatric audience. Many of the contributing authors have clinical backgrounds. Several of the authors make historical references to the meeting of psychoanalytic theory with developmental, ethological, and evolutionary theories and the way in which this meeting opens the door to a whole new field of inquiry. More importantly, however, their writings offer windows into developmental processes, which, once disrupted, can have long-term consequences. This book, while focusing mostly on normative aspects of attachment theory, points out the possible causal links both for continuity and discontinuity in attachment and its sequela. Thus, as a highly readable, highly informative, and reasonably priced text, I strongly recommend it to researchers and clinicians but perhaps most particularly to those whose clinical practices involve children and families.
*Reviewer
Rating Scale/ Échelle d’évaluation du réviseur
Excellent / Excellent
Very Good / Très bon
Good / Bon
Fair / Passable
Not recommended / Pas recommandé
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