Development of Attachment and its Application to CYCC Practice

The following global ideas guide the design and delivery of this course:

• As child and youth care practice focuses around the importance of building strong relationships with children and youth, it is important for the CYC practitioner to understand the process of attachment, how it changes and how it can be affected across the life span.
• Brain research has identified that attachment is a regulatory system that starts to develop in infancy and continues to develop throughout life via the process of dynamic, responsive interaction.
• The process of responsive caregiving enables the child to learn to sooth and calm his or her self.  This self knowledge of what to do when faced with adversity enables the development of self-regulation.
• Children who have experienced early trauna often lack the ablility to self-regulate.
• Self-regulation is a necessary quality for affecction and attachment
• A number of factors can affect the attachment process:
  • Parenting style
  • Parent illness
  • The child's temperament
  • The child's physical and/or medical appearance.
• Children and youth who have a strong attachment to their primary caregiver:
  • Have less difficulty with change
  • Are more confident
  • Have empathy for others
  • Are less likely to suffer mental healthcare issue
• Children who are insecure in their attachment:
  • Are more likely to find it difficult when creating relationships with others
  • Have an increased tendency towards mental health care issues
• Physical proximity to the primary caregiver and the family unit decreases as the child ages and friends and romantic attachments become important.  However, the family unit still remains a secure base from which to negotiate autonomy well into young adulthood.
• Although the attachment process is though to be universal, there are a number of different beliefs, vlaues and practices that surround it cross culturally.
• Attachment theory has affected how we take care of our children in the home, hospital, and in childcare.  Current laws around maternity and paternity leave, custody agreements and foster care all grow out of the understanding of the importance of these early relationships to later psycho-social development.  Currently, a number of researchers are utilizing attachment theory to guide intervention practices with conduct disordered youth and their families.