Hostname: page-component-7b7567c8c-7pwfn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-14T01:01:47.971Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

A psychobiological theory of attachment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 May 2011

Gary W. Kraemer
Affiliation:
Harlow Primate Laboratory, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53715, Electronic mail: kraemer@primate.wisc.edu

Abstract

This article describes a neurobiological basis for the “first attachment” of the primate infant to its caretaker. The infant normally internalizes a neurobiological “image” of the behavioral and emotional characteristics of its caregiver that later regulates important features of its brain function. Current models of sensorimotor analysis and its relation to emotion suggest that sensorimotor systems are also habit and memory systems, their functional status and lability regulated in part by biogenic amine systems. The intertwined development of neural and social functions can sometimes go awry. If the attachment process fails or the caregiver is incompetent, the infant may become socially dysfunctional. This helps explain the developmental psychopathology and later vulnerability to adult psychopathology that result from disruptions of social attachment.

Information

Type
Target Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable