Improving Maternal Care Behavior In Order To Improve The Quality Of The Mobile Home Mother And Child Attachment Intervention Study

Attachment security is an important basis for children's future development.The multiple risk factors affect attachment security of the children who grow up under disadvantaged conditions.Interventions to enhance early attachments with at risk children have become an important field of attachment study.The purpose of the study is to design interventions to enhance early attachments for migrant infants at risk.We conducted the intervention to enhance the attachment security of the migrant infants by improving maternal caring behaviors.20 immigrant mother-infant dyads participated in the study.There were 9 baby boys and 11 baby girls,whose average age is 12.4 months.Within a random assignment design,we compared two groups of migrant mother-infant dyads in which one experimental group was compared to a no-treatment control group,10 migrant mother-infant dyads each group.Before the intervention,both groups answered the relative questionnaires,participated in the strange situation procedure and home observations.The experimental group experienced a 6-week intervention,one time per week but the control group did not.After the intervention,both groups participated in home observations which were used to assess mother caring behaviors and children's attachment security.The results indicated that no difference existed in mother caring behaviors between the control group and the experimental group in the pre-test.However,comparing with the control group,the experimental group improved mother caring behaviors in the post-test.There was no difference in mother caring behaviors of the control group between the pre- and post-test.The post-test score of the experimental group in mother caring behaviors was higher than the score in the pre-test.There was no difference in immigrant infant security classification between the control group and the experimental group in the pre-test;however,comparing with the control group,the experimental group enhanced attachment security in the post-test.The differences of the scores were significant in the following scales:(1) smooth interactions with mother;(2) proximity to mother;(3) physical contact with mother between the control group and the experimental group in the post-test.There was no significant difference in the score of the scale of interactions with other adults between the control group and the experimental group in the post-test.Therefore,the children in the intervention group were more secure and their mothers were more responsive to their needs.The current intervention has effects on improving immigrant mother's caring behaviors and enhancing immigrant children's attachment security.