Associations between Turkish incarcerated mothers’ sensitivity and their co-residing children’s attachment: The moderating role of children’s temperament

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the associations between incarcerated mothers’ sensitivity and their co-residing children’s attachment security. Furthermore, the moderating role of children’s temperament on the associations between maternal sensitivity and children’s attachment security was examined. The study sample consisted of 84 incarcerated mothers (M_age = 29.9, SD = 5.6) and their 12- to 43-month-old (M = 25.3, SD = 8.3) children who co-resided with them in prison facilities. Maternal sensitivity and child’s attachment were assessed by observation of mother-child interaction using the Maternal Sensitivity Scale and the Turkish Toddler Attachment Sort-60, respectively. Mothers reported their children’s temperamental features (i.e. negative emotionality and effortful control) using the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire. Results showed that maternal sensitivity was related positively to children’s secure attachment and negatively to children’s disorganized attachment. Furthermore, children’s negative emotionality and effortful control moderated the associations between maternal sensitivity and children’s attachment. Specifically, maternal sensitivity negatively predicted children’s avoidant attachment only for children with low negative emotionality and with high effortful control. Additionally, maternal sensitivity negatively predicted children’s anxious attachment only for children with low effortful control. Results are discussed in terms of sample-specific experiences, contextual factors, and the differential susceptibility hypothesis.

KEYWORDS:

• Maternal incarceration
• co-residing children
• attachment
• maternal sensitivity
• temperament

Acknowledgments

We are extremely grateful to all the mother-child dyads who took part in this study. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for very helpful comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Society for Research in Child Development under the Patrice L. Engle Dissertation Grant in Global Early Child Development to the first author.