The aims of the proposed one-year longitudinal dissertation project are (a) to develop a strategy for assessing preadolescents' attachments to their caregivers by amalgamating recently developed and promising self-report questionnaires that have been designed for this purpose and (b) to test hypotheses about the impact of these amalgamated assessments of attachment styles on change over time in children's adjustment in the peer group. It is proposed that attachment styles in middle childhood can be assessed by combining assessments of children's perception of caregiver support/accessibility with assessments of children's self-reported style of coping with the caregiver (i.e., preoccupied or avoidant coping). For example, preoccupied attachment is defined as the conjoint occurrence of low perceived caregiver support and high preoccupied coping. The impact of attachment styles on change over a one-year period in children's adjustment in the peer group will be examined in a sample of about 500 children who will be in the fourth grade at the time of first testing.
