The Eight Principles Of Attachment Parenting Approach

Attachment Parenting
Attachment Parenting is a radical parenting approach where a parent devotes time and focus on developing a nurturing connection with their children. The main goal of attachment parenting is to raise children who can form healthy, emotional connections with other people throughout their life. Attachment parents believe this must begin by forming a respectful, compassionate connection between parent and child. According to WebMD, the Eight Principles of Attachment Parenting are: prepare for parenting, feed with love and respect, respond with sensitivity, use nurturing touch, engage in nighttime parenting, provide constant, loving care, practice positive discipline, and strive for balance in personal and family life. The approach of attachment parenting is based off of Bowlby’s Attachment theory. According to Bowlby’s theory children who form an enduring socioemotional relationship are more likely to survive in life. The theory has four phases of attachment: Pre-attachment, Attachment in the making, True attachment, and Reciprocal relationships. These phases closely follow the ways of how attachment parent advocates build their relationships with the child.
It also creates emotional development by a secure attachment between the parent and child, which teaches the infant that the parent will listen to their cues and meet their needs. This approach also helps a child’s social development by being able to form relationships with others later on in life. Its potential weakness is with spending so much time with the caregiver, the child is not able to make other attachments. “Baby wearing” for a long amount of time doesn’t allow the infant to have motor development to learn how to crawl or walk and explore its surroundings. Nighttime parenting also doesn’t allow the child to learn how to sleep on its