Assessing and quantifying the secure base script from narratives produced by preschool age children: justification...

Area of Science:

• Developmental Psychology
• Attachment Theory
• Childhood Development

Background:

• Attachment theory posits that early interaction sequences form internalized script-like representations.
• Secure base script representations are typically assessed in adults via word-prompt lists.
• These methods are unsuitable for assessing secure base script use in early childhood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop efficient scoring methods for secure base script use in early childhood.
• To adapt the Attachment Story Completion Task for larger sample sizes.
• To validate new scoring methods against established measures of attachment security.

Main Methods:

• Utilized stories from the Attachment Story Completion Task.
• Developed and implemented two novel approaches for story selection and scoring.
• Compared the new scoring methods with existing measures of early childhood attachment security.

Main Results:

• The two new scoring methods demonstrated substantial and significant overlap.
• Both methods showed significant associations with other measures of attachment security in early childhood.
• The developed methods offer increased efficiency for scoring secure base script use.

Conclusions:

• The novel scoring methods provide an efficient and valid approach to assessing secure base script use in young children.
• These methods facilitate larger-scale research on attachment security during early development.
• Findings support the integration of narrative assessment into the study of early childhood attachment.