Customer Reviews

Understanding Attachment: Parenting, Child Care, and Emotional Development

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Interesting overview of attachment as a general emotional phenomenon through the lifespan. I skimmed over some of this-- adolescence, for example, which is just too terrifying for me to think about this early (which tells to what extent I'm really looking at this from a parenting standpoint, I guess), and some about severe attachment disorders at the psychopathology level. It was interesting for me to read about the infant and toddler stages and about some of the basic data and means of gathering it. I'm not expert enough to really evaluate Mercer's accuracy, so I'll stop short of five stars, but the information was presented very clearly, certainly at a level appropriate beyond the academic and psychological professional community and accessible to an interested general audience.

There's also some compelling information about trends of attachment parenting and attachment therapy, neither of which, as Mercer presents it, seems to be firmly based on real study of attachment psychology, in spite of a fair amount of apparently loosely employed terminology and lip-service paid in both trends to figures and ideas in the historical development of a cohesive idea of attachment-- Mercer is clearly hostile to attachment therapy, and justifiably if she presents it accurately. Attachment parenting is coolly critiqued, but not proscribed.

This lukewarm-to-hostile range on these topics is certain to ruffle the feathers of fervent attachment-parenting and attachment therapy advocates (such as the one-star review below, whose author has devoted his only reviews to Mercer's three books). Attachment parenting comes off in the book as a little bit self-deluding, with many practices built on untested assumptions about their good to the child-- though they are likely very comforting to the parents (presumably mothers, from much of the information cited) who practice them and largely emotionally healthy, illusions aside about whose primary good they pursue. If it's fair to say (if overly general) that what's emotionally good for the mother is good for the child, it may be splitting hairs to point out that doing something to promote a bond from the mother to the baby is different than doing something to help the baby itself bond.

My casual recommendation is meaningless to serious students of psychology, but I'd recommend this book to new parents who want to know about their child's emotional development and how to foster it for a solid start to a lifetime of good emotional health.

This author has flooded Amazon and Journals with books and articles without an ounce of clinical experience. She has only taught college and has never ONCE seen a real-live patient. This book, along with the others, are so far off base and have no inclusion of important DSM IV and V criteria; differential diagnosis and solid clinical experience. yet she touts herself as an expert without ever evaluating or treating a child? Impossible to believe a word in any of her publications as she is skewed in relying on only " her teaching a a few research articles" vs true clinical practice. yet she pontificates from her ( retired ) teaching at a small college and criticizes true experts and feels she is some type of expert. Not even licensed.....another book written by an amature and non professional.

This was a very helpful book in terms of understanding the theory and research on attachment in children. (This book in not about Attachment Parenting, though the book discusses a number of child rearing philosophies, including Attachment Parenting). Many take home lessons about raising children, including setting up negotiation skills in preschoolers for when we parents want to leave them to go somewhere, so that in high school our children are willing to negotiate when when want to be away from us. Attachment is lifelong, and influences much about relationships throughout our lives. Reading this book helped me understand a number of adults better, too. As with all books on children, needs to be taken as a piece in a puzzle.