Infant-care provider attachments in contrasting child care settings II: Individual-oriented care after German reunification

Following the reunification of Germany, East German child care providers were urged to foster individual care provider-child relationships rather than peer relationships. In 1993-1997, the extent to which group- and dyadic-level measures of the care providers' behavior predicted variations in the security of infant-care provider attachment was studied in a sample of 70 German 11- to 30-month olds who were enrolled in child care facilities. Procedures and measures were the same as reported by Ahnert, Lamb, and Seltenheim (2000). Levels of care provider sensitivity and empathy were greater after reunification than before, and infants were more likely than those assessed prior to reunification to be securely attached to their care providers. Even though insecure attachments appeared to be common, disorganized patterns were infrequent. Measures of the care providers' sensitivity to individual infants did not predict attachment security although group-level differences in empathy were predictive. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.