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Three-generation attachment: How grandmothers and mothers contribute to

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Three-generation attachment: How grandmothers and mothers contribute

to children's attachment security
Gina A. Cooka; Lori A. Roggmanb
a
Early Intervention Research Institute, Utah State University, Logan, Utah, USA b Department of
Family, Consumer, and Human Development, Utah State University, Logan, Utah, USA

Online publication date: 16 December 2010

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mothers contribute to children's attachment security', Family Science, 1: 2, 112 — 122
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 Family Science
Vol. 1, No. 2, April 2010, 112–122

Three-generation attachment: How grandmothers and mothers contribute

RFSC

to children’s attachment security

Gina A. Cooka* and Lori A. Roggmanb
Family Science

a
Early Intervention Research Institute, Utah State University, Logan, Utah, USA; bDepartment of Family, Consumer, and Human
Development, Utah State University, Logan, Utah, USA

Infant attachment is influenced by the mother’s responsiveness, which is, in turn, thought to be based on her own history of
attachment. When a single mother lives with her own mother, the child’s grandmother may influence the child’s attachment
not only indirectly through the mother’s attachment history but also directly through the grandmother’s involvement in car-
egiving and through the grandmother-mother relationship. As part of an Early Head Start study, 57 single mothers and 21
coresident grandmothers reported their adult attachment style at program enrollment. Mothers’ parenting behaviors were
observed at 14 and 24 months, and children’s secure base behavior was reported by their mothers at 10, 14, and 18 months.
Grandmothers’ and mothers’ security scores were related to children’s security but in different directions. Because results
suggest the importance of context in understanding intergenerational processes, a follow-up qualitative study was conducted
Downloaded By: [Utah State University] At: 23:14 25 January 2011

when children were seven to eight years old in which three of the coresiding grandmother-mother dyads were interviewed
about their past and current relationships and living arrangements. The qualitative results enrich the quantitative results by
offering descriptions of how mothers and grandmothers see their relationships with each other and with the children in
terms of patterns of influence between grandmothers and mothers and between mothers and children.
Keywords: intergenerational; attachment; grandparenting; parenting behaviour; mother–grandmother relationship

The beginnings of social-emotional development can be
seen in the mother-infant relationship. It is usually the first
relationship a child develops, and the quality of this rela-
tionship will influence future relationships and other
aspects of later functioning. The mother’s sensitive and
responsive caregiving is a key factor contributing to the
quality of her relationship with her child by its effects on
the development of attachment. Ainsworth, Blehar,
Waters, and Wall (1978) described attachment as an affec-
tional bond that an infant forms with a caregiver and that
endures across time and situations. Bowlby (1988)
described the development of a secure-base figure that
provides protection, experiences, and exploration from
which the infant can organize a sense of self as well as
form an emotional bond. Bowlby theorized that this primary
attachment is formed around the child’s first birthday and
from then on has a major impact on the social-emotional
development of the child.
The quality of attachment in the early mother-infant
relationship has a broad influence on children’s developing
social competence. During the preschool and early school
years, securely attached children, compared with their
insecurely attached peers, have the social advantages of
fewer behavior problems, better self-concepts, more social
confidence, greater social participation, higher sociometric
status indicated by more children naming them as friends,
and overall simply a higher level of competence in social
situations (Bost, Vaughn, Washington, Cielinski, & Bradbard,
1998; Erickson, Sroufe, & Egeland, 1985; Howes, Matheson,
& Hamilton, 1994; LaFreniere & Sroufe, 1985; Seifer &
Schiller, 1995). Securely attached children not only
develop greater social competence, they also develop bet-
ter problem-solving abilities (Colman & Thompson, 2002;
Frankel & Bates, 1990; LaFreniere & Sroufe, 1985;
Turner, 1991) and more expressive language skills (Belsky
& Fearon, 2002). Thus, the quality of attachment with the
mother and other caregivers plays an early influential role in
the development of children’s later social and academic
skills.
Infant attachment is related not only to a mother’s cur-
rent parenting behavior and relationship with her child, but
also to the mother’s attitudes and feelings about attach-
ment from earlier experiences with her own mother’s
responsiveness to her needs for comfort and care when she
was a child (Ainsworth, 1989; Main, 1995; Main & Gold-
wyn, 1998). The quality of the mother-infant attachment is
thus influenced by the mother’s own thoughts and feelings
about attachment, her internal working model, developed
through her early attachment relationships (Bretherton,
1996) in addition to being influenced by the mother’s abil-
ity to be a sensitive caregiver despite her early attachment
relationships. One of the first studies of attachment across
multiple generations, by Benoit and Parker (1994),
showed that secure grandmothers tend to have secure

*Corresponding author. Email: gina.cook@usu.edu

ISSN 1942-4620 print/ISSN 1942-4639 online

© 2010 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/19424620.2010.531051
http://www.informaworld.com

daughters and secure grandchildren. In the years since that
study, other researchers have also examined attachment in
three-generation models (e.g., Kretchmar & Jacobvitz,
2002; Spieker & Bensley, 1994).
When a single mother lives with her own mother, the
child’s grandmother may influence the child’s attachment
not only indirectly through the mother’s attachment but
also more directly through the grandmother’s involvement
in providing caregiving for the child. In 1997, almost 8%
of all children under the age of 18 lived in the United
States in homes with a grandparent (Bryson & Casper,
1999). With nearly 5.8 million children living in the same
household as their grandparents, and approximately 75%
of them living in grandparent-headed households (U.S.
Bureau of the Census, 2001), the need to understand the
context of attachment for these children is becoming
increasingly important. This study examined intergenera-
tional patterns of attachment by exploring the grand-
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mother-mother, mother-child, and grandmother-child
relationships in multigenerational families.
Intergenerational continuity of attachment security
Some theorists and researchers have suggested that a
mother’s parenting behavior is based on her own history
of attachment developed in the context of her relationship
with her mother and other close relationships (Ainsworth,
1989). Mothers who remember feeling accepted by their
mothers during childhood are generally more sensitive and
less intrusive with their infants compared with those who
remember their own mothers as being either disengaged or
overprotective (Kretchmar & Jacobvitz, 2002). Bowlby’s
(1982) theory suggests that internal working models are
stable across development and even across generations.
Mothers with internalized security are more likely to have
been responded to by their own mothers sensitively, and in
turn, more likely to respond to their infants sensitively.
Several studies have now shown that a mother’s recollection
of her own attachment experiences predicts her infant’s
attachment security (Benoit & Parker, 1994; Fonagy,
Steele, Moran, Steele, & Higgitt, 1993; Fonagy, Steele, &
Steele, 1991; Huth-Bocks, Levendosky, Bogat, & von
Eye, 2004; Slade & Cohen, 1996; Ward & Carlson, 1995).
While much emphasis has been placed on the trans-
mission of parenting styles across generations and on the
similarities between generations, few studies have exam-
ined the characteristics of either the parent or the child that
might mediate the intergenerational transmission of
attachment (Serbin & Karp, 2004). Specific protective fac-
tors have not been identified, yet research indicates that
while secure mothers are more likely to have secure
infants there is often intergenerational discontinuity among
those with insecure relationships (George & Solomon, 1996).
Recently, Poehlmann (2003) described this inconsistency
as “a positive finding because it indicates that security
Family Science 113
tends to replicate itself across generations, whereas inse-
curity is not automatically transmitted” (p. 160). The inter-
generational transmission of parenting styles, including
attachment-related parenting behavior, has been found to
be less dependent on specific content in the past relation-
ship and more related to the overall organization of the
current relationship. The consistency of the mother’s earlier
attachment experiences does not affect her child’s attach-
ment as much as the quality of her current relationship
with the child’s grandmother does (Cassidy & Shaver,
1999). Intergenerational continuity in parenting has been
found to be mediated by mothers’ present relationships
with their children’s grandparents as well as by the social
support received from them (Chen & Kaplan, 2001).
Grandmothers’ influence may not be limited to indi-
rect transmission through the mother’s attachment, but
may be more directly transmitted if the grandmother influ-
ences the mother’s parenting. Although there is almost no
research on grandparent-child attachment relationships, at
least one study has found that grandmother support usually
facilitates positive caregiving by mothers (Spieker &
Bensley, 1994).
In many cases, a grandmother’s influence may not be
limited only to transmission through the mother’s attach-
ment or parenting but may influence the child’s security of
attachment even more directly if the grandmother is
involved in the child’s caregiving, especially if the mother
and the child live with the grandmother. Attachment is not
exclusive to the mother and child; most infants form more
than one attachment (Bowlby, 1982). In fact, children
often have several attachment figures in an “attachment
hierarchy” in which the child develops a stronger prefer-
ence for one caregiver, typically the mother but possibly
another person who is in the primary caregiving role, such
as a father or a grandparent (Ainsworth, 1967; Bowlby,
1982).
Other risk factors, such as poverty or poor education,
may also affect intergenerational transmission of attach-
ment. When families are under stress, as many families in
poverty are, children are more likely to develop insecure/
anxious attachment relationships (Vaughn, Egeland,
Sroufe, & Waters, 1979). Living in poverty often has a
negative influence on the caregiver-child relationship,
which influences a child’s ability to develop a secure
attachment. Families living in poverty, compared with
middle-income families, are more likely to have children
with insecure attachment (Diener, Nievar, & Wright,
2003). Families living in poverty are also more likely to
live in multigenerational homes, in which the relationship
between the mother and grandmother can have more direct
influences on children’s caregiving environments. The
mother-grandmother relationship may influence the moth-
ers’ parenting behaviors in ways that may either protect
children from or put them at risk for developing insecure
attachments (Lyons-Ruth, Easterbrooks, & Cibelli, 1997;
 114 G.A. Cook and L.A. Roggman
Zeanah, Boris, & Larrieu, 1997). Among infants of teen-
age mothers living in low-income multigenerational
households, social support was a better predictor of attach-
ment security than maternal maturity or self-esteem (Hess,
Papas, & Black, 2002), suggesting a positive influence
from support by family members. Support from grand-
mothers in another study, however, was unrelated to car-
egiving by the teenage mothers who resided with their
children’s grandmothers (Spieker & Bensley, 1994). To
understand more about how attachment could be influ-
enced across generations in low-income families, we
explored aspects of attachment across three generations in
relation to maternal parenting behavior in a group of low-
income families.
As part of a larger Early Head Start study, a local sam-
ple of low-income mothers with infants under a year old
were interviewed about attachment aspects of their close
relationships and about their children’s secure base behav-
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ior and then later observed in parenting interactions with
their children. Data from mothers who were unmarried
and/or living with their own mothers, the grandmothers,
along with data from the coresident grandmothers who
were also interviewed about their attachment attitudes,
were used in a quantitative analysis of these aspects of
attachment in relation to mothers’ parenting behaviors. In
addition, three grandmother-mother-child triads were later
identified to participate in qualitative interviews to explore
their thoughts and feelings about their past and current liv-
ing arrangements and their intertwined relationships. This
mixed-methods approach, using both quantitative and
qualitative data from mothers, children, and grandmothers
in three-generation households, is intended to add under-
standing beyond what might be found by a single
approach (Teddlie & Tashakkori, 2003).
The purpose of this study was to identify a subset of
unmarried mothers of infants who lived either alone or
with their own mothers and to examine quantitative and
qualitative data about aspects of attachment relationships
from all three generations, collected by interviews, and
about parenting behaviors, coded from semi-structured
observations. As part of the larger study, all mothers were
interviewed upon enrollment into the study and, in as
many cases as possible, were asked to identify a “second-
ary caregiver” who helped take care of the child. Not all
single mothers identified a secondary caregiver, but many
identified the child’s coresident grandmother as a second-
ary caregiver, and the grandmother was then also inter-
viewed. Data from interviews with these mothers and
grandmothers were used to examine associations among
aspects of attachment from grandmothers, mothers, and
children, to test these aspects of attachment in association
with observed maternal parenting behavior, and to explore
other related factors. The following questions were
addressed: Is children’s secure base behavior related to
their mothers’ or grandmothers’ responses about close
relationships? Are mothers’ and grandmothers’ responses
about close relationships related? Are these aspects of
attachment across generations related to mothers’ parent-
ing behavior or to demographic or psychosocial factors?
Methods
Participants. In a study of applicants to a local Early Head
Start program, interview data were initially collected from
57 mothers who were single and/or living with their own
mothers and from 21 coresident grandmothers identified
by the mothers as secondary caregivers to the children par-
ticipating in the study. Among these 21 coresident three-
generation families, 17 were single mothers who had
never married, two were separated from the child’s father,
and two were married. The mothers’ ages averaged 18.4
and ranged from 15 to 26. Education ranged from eighth
grade to an associates degree, with over half the mothers
having at least a high school diploma. The family annual
income mean was $10,015, ranging from $0 to $50,000;
averaging $2343 per person per year, ranging from $0 to
$10,000 per person per year. The U.S. poverty rate is an
annual income of less than $22,128 for a family of four
(DeNavas-Walt, Proctor, & Smith, 2010). Over 92% of
this sample fell below the poverty line. In the 36 other sin-
gle-mother families, mothers reported that they were
unmarried and not living with a partner but did not iden-
tify a grandmother as a secondary caregiver. The mothers’
average age in this noncoresident group was 20.6, ranging
from 14 to 33. Education ranged from sixth grade to an
associates degree, with half of the mothers having at least
a high school diploma. The family annual income mean
was $4529, ranging from $0 to $32,000, averaging $1667
per person per year, ranging from $0 to $10,666 per
person per year.
Procedures. Families were recruited as research par-
ticipants when they applied for the program. At that time,
all mothers and identified grandmothers were interviewed
by a trained data collector in a telephone interview or, if a
telephone was not available, in person in their homes or
another location of their choosing. As part of the inter-
view, mothers and grandmothers were asked about their
attachment attitudes. Because enrollment could occur dur-
ing pregnancy, questions about the child were asked in
later interviews with mothers at a sequence of child age
points. These interviews were conducted in families’
homes as part of more extensive data collection that
involved both interview and observation methods. Moth-
ers were interviewed about their children’s secure base
behavior when the children were 10, 14, 18, and 36
months old. Mothers were also observed in semi-struc-
tured play interactions with their children at ages 14, 24,
and 36 months.
To obtain more contextual data, we used qualitative
interviews to explore relationships among grandmothers,

mothers, and children in the three-generational households
in our study. A separate qualitative interview was con-
ducted with three of the families in the original research
sample. When the children from the original study were in
second grade and between seven and eight years old, nine
local grandmother-mother-child triads were identified
from the larger sample to participate in further qualitative
study. Three triads were contacted and agreed to particip-
ate in the qualitative portion of this study. We purposely
selected a triad that would represent each attachment style,
therefore one mother who scored high on ambivalence,
one who scored high on avoidance, and one who scored
high on security were chosen. All three mothers inter-
viewed were teenagers when they became pregnant, and
none were married at that time. The mothers ranged in age
from 23 to 28 years old at the time of the interviews. Both
the mother and grandmother in the three families who par-
ticipated were interviewed at length, and transcripts of
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their interviews were coded for content related to the
research questions.
Measures
Adult security. As a measure of adult attachment security,
questions from the Adult Attachment Style scale (AAS;
Simpson, Rholes, & Nelligan, 1992) were used in inter-
views with mothers and grandmothers at the time of
enrollment. The AAS includes avoidant and anxious/
ambivalent subscales from which scores for avoidance and
ambivalence can be derived. Also, an overall security
score can be derived by reverse coding the items and then
summing items from both subscales. The scale was
developed based on work on adult romantic attachment
relationships, so the wording on a few of the items was
changed to refer to close relationships more generally so
that it would be more appropriate for single mothers not
currently in a romantic relationship. These item wording
changes were reviewed and approved by the second author
of the original measure. Items that refer to “partner” were
revised to refer to “people close to me.” Items from this
scale include “I find it difficult to trust others completely”
and “I’m comfortable having others depend on me.” This
13-item scale has alphas ranging from .58 to .81.
Child security. As a measure of child attachment
security, mothers completed the Attachment Q-set (AQS;
Waters, 1987) at ages 10, 14, 18, and 36 months. Ques-
tions from the 90 items of the AQS were used in inter-
views with the mothers two weeks before the in-home data
collection session in which the mothers were helped to
complete the full card sort of the items. Mothers were
encouraged to ask questions about the items and to
observe their children with the items in mind during the
two weeks between the interview and the in-home data
collection session. During the in-home assessment,
parents sorted the behavioral descriptions, which were
Family Science 115
individually printed on cards, according to how well items
described their child (“Q-sort”). The AQS Q-sort criterion-
correlation score was used for analyses. The Q-sort crite-
rion-correlation was developed from the scores of 16
experts, developmental psychologists who provided sorts
for the ideal security-attached child. The reliability of
these composite scores was .95 or higher (Waters &
Deane, 1985). The more similar the subject was to the
hypothetical “most secure child” the higher their correla-
tion score, resulting in a score ranging from -1.0 to +1.0,
with a +1.0 representing the most secure score possible.
Observer sorts such as the AQS were initially devel-
oped to be used by trained outside observers, and the use
of such sorts by mothers has been controversial. Yet, in a
study conducted by Waters and Deane (1985) of 50 mid-
dle-class families a correlation of .80 was reported
between trained observers and mothers. The phone inter-
view prior to the in-home assessment provided the parents
with familiarity of the items as well as additional time to
think about their child’s behaviors and observe their child
to increase the reliability of these mother sorts.
Maternal behavior. A three-bag observation procedure
was conducted and coded using seven-point coding scales
of maternal behaviors of supportiveness, quality of assist-
ance, intrusiveness, detachment, and negativity. The
observation consisted of a videotaped 10-minute interac-
tion of the mother and child in their home. The mother was
given three bags with different items in each bag (e.g., a
book, pretend toys, manipulative toys) and told to play
with their child dividing their time between the bags how
they wished. A trained coding team established inter-rater
reliability of 85% (exact or within one-point agreement)
and then conducted weekly inter-rater reliability checks on
15% of that week’s assignments. Percent agreement aver-
aged 94% for all 36-month coders, with a range of 86 to
100% (Berlin, Brady-Smith, & Brooks-Gunn, 2002).
Qualitative interviews. Qualitative interviews were
conducted when the children were seven to eight years old
and consisted of a series of open-ended questions about
their relationships with each other, with the child, and with
other family members and friends during the past seven
years. The interview also asked about living arrangements,
caregiving and discipline, and the caregiving roles of both
the mother and the grandmother. Mothers and grandmoth-
ers were visited in their homes and interviewed using
these open-ended questions (see Table 1). Joint interviews
lasted approximately 90 minutes, an individual mother
interview was approximately 50 minutes long, and an indi-
vidual grandmother interview lasted about 30 minutes.
The interviews were then transcribed and read for initial
codes. Two transcript coders read all transcripts and came
up with codes separately and then met to discuss similari-
ties and differences in codes. After initial coding was com-
pleted the coders met on two more occasions to discuss
themes and research questions. Preliminary content codes
 116 G.A. Cook and L.A. Roggman

Table 1. Interview questions.

A. We have been studying (child’s name) for the past 7–8 years now. What is your relationship with your child like? Probes: When
do you spend time together? What do you do then? (Mother/Grandmother)
B. What have the living arrangements been like for you and your child/grandchild? (from birth until now) Probe: How have they
changed? (Mother/Grandmother)
If you don’t currently live together, how often do you see your grandchild? (Grandmother)
C. What has been your role with your child/grandchild? Who disciplines? Who does the child go to when they are hurt or need
something? Who makes decisions about the child? (Mother/Grandmother)
D. What can you tell me about your relationship with your mother/daughter? What is it like? How close [or distant] are you
emotionally? If you could change anything about your relationship with her, what would that be? Why? (Mother/Grandmother)
E. Tell me about other relationships in your life. Spouse/significant other? Parents? Other children? (Mother/Grandmother)
F. How would you describe your mother’s/daughter’s relationship with ________ [target child]? How would you describe your
mother’s/daughter’s relationship with her other grandchildren/children (if any)? What do you like about her relationship with
the child and what if anything bothers you? (Mother/Grandmother)
G. Tell me your favorite story about you and your son/daughter/grandchild. Tell me your favorite story about you and your mother/
daughter. (Mother/Grandmother)

included: single motherhood, teenage pregnancy, “being Grandmothers’ attachment attitudes also were related to
there,” divorce, parent-child relationship, parent-child children’s attachment security although not in the
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friendship, lack of a father figure, independence, responsi-
bility, living arrangements, roles, critical toward men, and
parenting skills. For this group of grandmothers and moth-
ers there were many similarities across families and a few
distinct differences.
expected direction. Grandmothers’ secure attachment
attitudes were negatively correlated with the children’s
10-month attachment security, r = -.56*. Intergenerational
continuity was not reflected in this pattern of correlations
between mother, grandmother, and child security scores.

Results
Initially, demographic differences were examined in the Table 2. Mother attachment attitudes in relation to grand-
mother attachment attitudes for mothers living with their
resident and coresident groups. Group comparisons infants’ grandmother (N = 21).
showed that there were no significant differences in any of
the demographic variables except for household income Grandmother attachment attitudesat
baseline interview
(higher for coresident mothers) and for maternal age
(higher for noncoresident mothers). These differences Mother attachment
would be expected based on the reasons why mothers attitudes at baseline Summary
would be living with their children’s grandmothers. interview Avoidant Ambivalent score
Coresident grandmothers’ attachment attitudes were Avoidant .24 .25 .30
related to mothers’ attachment attitudes at baseline, r = .47*, Ambivalent .50* .34 .53*
but not at later times (see Table 2). Mothers’ attachment Summary score .43+ .34 .48*
attitudes were related to children’s attachment security for *Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
both coresident and noncoresident mothers (see Table 3). +Correlation is significant at the 0.10 level (2-tailed).

Table 3. Mother and grandmother attachment attitudes in relation to child attachment security for coresident mothers (n = 18–21) and
noncoresident mothers (n = 23–30).
Child attachment security
Adult attachment attitude 10 month (non) 14 month (non) 18 month (non)
Maternal avoidance at baseline interview −.06 (−.06) −.12 (−.52*) −.26 (−.24)
Maternal ambivalence at baseline interview −.16 (−.30) −.43+ (−.30) −.03 (−.50*)
Maternal attachment security at baseline interview .13 (.20) .31 (.55**) .18 (.44*)
Maternal avoidance at 10-month interview −.16 (−.06) −.39 (−.04) −.38 (−.31)
Maternal ambivalence at 10-month interview −.31 (.12) −.57* (−.20) −.33 (.17)
Maternal attachment security at 10-month interview .24 (.00) .53* (−.14) .44+ (.18)
Grandmother avoidance at baseline interview .50* .12 .17
Grandmother ambivalence at baseline interview .41+ −.18 −.01
Grandmother attachment security at baseline interview −.56* .02 −.12
*Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
+Correlation is significant at the 0.10 level (2-tailed).
 Family Science 117

Mothers’ parenting behaviors were related to children’s Table 6. Predictive model of 18-month attachment security.
attachment security in both coresident and noncoresident
Model: 18-month Standardized
mothers although in different directions and more strongly attachment security coefficients t Sig. R2
for those living independently. For mothers living with the
infants’ grandmothers several correlations were not in the Maternal supportiveness .12 .64
Coresident −.07 −.43
expected direction. For example, maternal intrusiveness in Supportiveness × coresident −.45 −2.48 .04 .26*
the coresident group was unexpectedly positively correlated
with 14-month infant security, while it was negatively *Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
correlated in the noncoresident group (see Table 4).
Although t-tests indicate no statistically significant group
differences for security scores, children of mothers who To understand more about the intergenerational
were not coresiding appear to have a higher average security process of attachment, contextual data about grandmother-
score than children of mothers who were coresiding with mother-child relationships need to be explored. The quali-
the children’s grandmothers (see Table 5). Demographic tative interviews provided contextual data from three
variables such as income, age, or education were not asso- grandmother-mother-child dyads. “Jamie,” a 28-year-old
ciated with security scores. married mother of two children, had lived with her mother
A regression model (see Table 6) was tested to determine when her children were infants. She was employed, and
if living with the grandmother moderates the influence of although she no longer lived with her mother, her mother
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mothers’ supportive play on their children’s 18-month did take care of her children every day for a couple of
attachment security. Due to the small sample size and the hours while she was at work. Jamie and her child both had
number of missing variables the regression model was high security scores while Jamie’s mother scored high on
tested using MPLUS with maximum likelihood estimates. ambivalence. “Carrie,” a 23-year-old single mother of one
As shown in Table 6, the interaction term was statistically child, was also employed, and while she also no longer
significant, with a coefficient of -.45, and the model lived with her mother, her mother did take care of her
accounted for 26% of the variance. The interaction effect daughter two to three afternoons a week and some week-
was explored by examining the relation of supportive play ends while she worked. Carrie’s child had a low security
to child attachment security within each group, the coresi- score, Carrie had a high ambivalence score and her mother
dent group and the noncoresident group. Only in the non- had a high avoidance score. “JoAnn,” a 23-year-old
coresident group did mothers’ supportive play predict mother of three children, had been recently divorced and
children’s attachment security. had only visitation rights with her children for the past
month. She had been living with her mother since the
divorce, and both were involved with the children only on
weekends. Before the divorce JoAnn lived with her chil-
Table 4. Correlation between maternal parenting behaviors
and infant security for coresident and noncoresident mothers. dren. JoAnn scored high on the avoidance scale, her child
scored low on security, and her mother scored high on
Child attachment security security. Each of the three triads lived together until the
Parenting behaviors 18 month (non) 36 month (non) child was anywhere from 11 months old to approximately
two years old.
Maternal play −.05 (.57*) −.33 (.51+)
supportiveness at 14 months
All three grandmothers indicated that it was important
Maternal intrusiveness .55+ (−.04) .57+ (.09) for them to “be there” for their daughter and their grand-
at 14 months child, admitted that there had been times during their
Maternal play −.21 (.38) −.19 (.10) daughters’ teenage years when things were difficult, but
supportiveness at 24 months concluded that over the years things had become better
Maternal intrusiveness at 24 −.16 (−.23) .38 (−.53*)
months
and they now considered themselves friends. Additionally,
all three stated that the mother was the primary caregiver,
+Correlation is significant at the 0.10 level (2-tailed). the one who made all of the major decisions for the child,
and the one who did the majority of the disciplining as
well. While all three mothers had moved out of the grand-
Table 5. Mean attachment security scores for coresident and
noncoresident children. mothers’ home by the time the child was two years old, all
three grandmothers were still very involved in their grand-
Attachment security Nonresident Coresident children’s lives and admitted to having a special relationship
mean score children children
with their grandchild because they spent time together
10 month .26 .16 during infancy. Two of the three grandmothers took care
14 month .28 .23 of their grandchildren several days a week while the
18 month .26 .20
mother worked.
 118 G.A. Cook and L.A. Roggman
Four other distinct themes emerged from the analysis
of the qualitative interview data. These themes included
independence, relationships, parenting styles, and security.
The following patterns and connections became apparent.
Independence. All three triads seemed to be very
strong and independent and to share these values between
mother and grandmother. A theme emerged of women as
independent and able to be successful as single mothers.
For example, Carrie’s mother said, “You have to wonder
if that’s how I was raised, and my mother was very inde-
pendent and so maybe I am, and I passed that on.” Inde-
pendence in the maternal role and the ability to care for
her own child was also apparent; Jamie said, “She was just
kind of grandma, not anything more. . . . . I always took
care of her [the child] . . . I did everything except for when
I was at work.” JoAnn’s mother describes JoAnn as “very
independent . . . she took care of him [the child] and she
did all that.” It was clear from many of these statements
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that the mother was the primary caregiver in all three
triads and that the grandmother was there primarily to sup-
port and assist financially and not as the primary caregiver
or disciplinarian.
Relationships. The grandmother-mother relationships
in these families seemed to be more like friendships than
traditional mother-daughter relationships. All the mothers
had become adults in their twenties, living on their own,
and they seemed to consider their relationships with their
mothers as friendships. Two of the three triads described
difficult times during their adolescence, but all three
agreed that they were more like friends with their mothers
once they became adults. Jamie commented, “Except for
when I was a teenager . . . . I’ve always had a good rela-
tionship with her.” Carrie said, “We didn’t really get along
as well when I was a teenager.” All three agreed that their
relationships are good now and have very little conflict.
Carrie’s mother describes their relationship as “close, but
not so close that we can’t each have our own lives.”
Jamie’s mother believes that their relationship changed
with the birth of the grandchild, she said “[we have] a
very, very good relationship, it didn’t begin until [the
grandchild was born], I think that’s what changed and
turned things around, she was kind of a little rebellious
and different things like that, she . . . it’s just a really good
relationship, I think we’re more like close friends, we like
to do things together, go shopping together, we do a lot
now.” Very little conflict was discussed and in general
these relationships all seemed strong and positive.
The grandmother-grandchild relationships were also
strong. All three grandmothers admitted to having a closer
relationship with the grandchild that had lived with them
than with their other grandchildren. Carrie’s mother
described the relationship as different from that with her
other grandchildren. She said “in some ways [it is not dif-
ferent] but in some ways just closer because I am around
her more and I have been with her, tended her basically
since she was born, and we’re just closer, she’s just a little
more special.”
Parenting styles. The biggest difference among the
three triads was parenting style. Jamie considered herself a
strict disciplinarian, unlike her mother; while the other two
mothers, Carrie and JoAnn, seemed to parent similarly to
their mothers and were more like friends to their children
than disciplinarians. For Jamie, a major theme was that of
communication. She felt that communication had been
poor between her and her parents when she was growing
up, and she did not want her relationship with her daughter
to be like her relationships with her parents. She men-
tioned the importance of communication 23 times in her
interview. For Carrie, a concern was the lack of a father
figure for the granddaughter. Both mother and grand-
mother were concerned about future relationships and the
lack of any male figures in the child’s life. Another theme
that seemed especially important to Carrie was her par-
ents’ divorce and its impact on her mother and herself. She
thought that the divorce could have been partly to blame
for her inability to have good relationships with men, and
this led to a theme of three generations of single moms in
her family.
The mothers described their parenting styles as influ-
enced by the way they were parented. Two of the three
mothers, Carrie and JoAnn, said that their parenting styles
were very similar to that of their mothers, but Jamie con-
tinually emphasized the differences between her and her
mother. When asked if she thought her discipline style was
similar to her mother’s, she said, “No, I am really strict
about things . . . I just look at a lot of stuff that I didn’t
have to do when I was younger, like bedtimes. . . . I don’t
ever remember being put to bed. . . . I am just a lot more
strict.” Carrie’s mother and JoAnn’s mother both thought
that their daughters were doing a good job parenting des-
pite the struggles of being single mothers. Carrie’s mother
said; “She’s a very good mom, a very special mom,
really.” Carrie thought that while her parenting style is
similar to her mother’s she hopes to lecture her daughter
less than her mother lectures her. She commented; “It’s
just the lecturing, and I know she probably doesn’t think
she’s lecturing me [that] it’s just a suggestion, but some-
times it’s a pain, sometimes it’s just like not really fun.”
Security. Finally, there was a theme of security with
one another, but not necessarily in other relationships. As
noted earlier, all three triads feel very comfortable with
one another. Jamie’s mother said that they are “always
there for each other” and that “if [Jamie] had any problems
you know that I’d always be there to help her and she’s
always there for me as well.” For those interviewed
together they seemed at ease answering most of the ques-
tions in front of one another. Interestingly, all three triads
described their relationships with men as difficult and in
some cases described these men in a derogatory manner.
JoAnn discussed her relationship with her ex-husband

negatively and indicated that he was very controlling. Car-
rie’s mother described their discussions about men when
she said, “Sometimes we bad mouth guys. . . we’re not
man haters. . . we more like joke about it. Like, ‘Well, he’s
a real loser, isn’t he?’” In this interview the mother and
grandmother were discussing their concerns over a lack of a
father figure for the child, and Carrie said, “She’s probably
not developing a good feeling of a relationship with men.”
Her mother replied, “Yeah, that’s something I wonder
about once in a while, because there’s not a father-figure
or grandfather in her daily life.” Two of the triads also dis-
cussed the multiple relationships that they have had over
the years and their concerns about future relationships.
Summary of findings
In general, the mothers and grandmothers in this study
seem to have good relationships with each other. They do
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not remember having many disagreements or complica-
tions over parenting, disciplining, or caregiving.
Although several themes were common across inter-
views, each pair seemed to have their own set of con-
cerns. Jamie thought that communication was very
important. It was something that she lacked with her par-
ents when she was growing up, and she wanted to do
things different with her daughter. Carrie and her mother
seemed most concerned with the lack of a father figure
for the granddaughter. Security in relationships seemed
to be a strong theme in this interview; while both grand-
mother and mother seemed to feel secure in their rela-
tionship and in talking to each other and sharing their
feelings, neither seemed to feel secure in their relation-
ships with men. They also discussed independence and
why this may be a reason they are both single. Finally,
JoAnn and her mother discussed their independence and
joked about being critical of men.
Discussion
Unlike a simple repetition of similarity in aspects of
attachment across generations, as suggested by the term
“intergenerational transmission,” the grandmothers and
mothers in our study reported attachment attitudes that
were related to the children’s secure base behavior in quite
different ways, with mother and child aspects of attach-
ment associated more positively than grandmother with
either mother or child. Coresidence moderated the impact
of mothers’ parenting behavior on children’s attachment
security. In fact, coresidence seemed to reverse the typical
effects of mothers’ positive parenting behaviors even
though mothers’ attachment attitudes were positively
related to children’s security. For a mother living with a
grandmother, the nature of behavior that appears intrusive
or supportive during play with the child may carry differ-
ent meanings. For example, a young mother still living in
Family Science 119
her childhood home may try especially hard to get
involved in her child’s play, as a means of being engaged
and taking on an authority role with the child, such that her
behaviors appear intrusive to an objective observer but are
actually indicators of engaged parenting in the context of a
coresident household. While these results suggest that
coresidence does moderate the associations between
mother and child measures of security, there is not enough
information to indicate the process by which living with a
grandmother may influence mother or child security.
While these results suggest that living with the grand-
mother does affect the relationship between the mother
and child, they also suggest that the pathways of influence
are complex. From the in-depth interviews with a small
subset of the mothers and grandmothers, qualitative
themes of communication, fathers/men, independence,
and security suggest both attachment-related and other
aspects of mother-grandmother relationships that add to
the complexity.
Previous research has suggested that coresidence,
compared to living independently, may cause tension
between grandmothers and mothers, may create a need for
greater individuation for mothers to feel competent, and
may even decrease the influence of the grandmother-
mother relationship (Putallaz, Costanzo, Grimes, & Sherman,
1998; Wakschlag, Chase-Lansdale, & Brooks-Gunn,
1996). Although grandmothers and mothers in our study
had similar attitudes about attachment and seemed to have
good relationships with each other, their relationship atti-
tudes affected infants in opposite ways. In addition, the
living arrangements of all participants did not support the
grandmother as the primary caregiver, all three mothers
had moved out of the grandmothers’ homes by the time
their children were two years old. All grandmothers
reported that their role in the care of the child was helping
the mother to be successful in meeting the child’s needs
primarily in a financial and supporting role. This may
explain why grandmothers’ attachment security was nega-
tively correlated with the children’s attachment security; it
may be due to the fact that in all three triads the mother
was the primary caregiver, thus fostering the primary
attachment.
Intergenerational influences can be complex when a
mother and child coreside with a grandmother because
coresidence, compared to living independently, may cause
tension between grandmothers and mothers (Putallaz et al.,
1998; Wakschlag et al., 1996). Correlations for mothers liv-
ing with the infants’ grandmothers were not always in the
expected direction and weaker at baseline compared with
the correlations for mothers in the noncoresiding group.
This suggests that intervening factors such as the child’s
relationship with the grandmother may influence how the
mother and child interact with each other and, in turn, how
their attachment relationship develops (Posada, Waters,
Crowell, & Lay, 1995). It is also possible that these differ-
 120 G.A. Cook and L.A. Roggman
ences may be due to the relationship between the mother
and grandmother during the time of coresidence. While
the three dyads all report a good relationship with each
other after a few years of living apart, the relationship may
not have been as positive during the time of coresidence,
when the mothers were less mature and the challenges of
parenting a young infant would have caused more stress
than during the child’s school-age years. All three dyads
mentioned that their relationships had not been as positive
during the mother’s younger years. Mothers who continue
to coreside with their own mothers may have a different
relationship than those who choose to no longer coreside.
The intergenerational transmission of attachment-related
parenting behavior has been found to be less dependent on
specific content in the past relationship and more related
to the overall organization of the current relationship with
the grandmother at the time the child is forming their early
attachment relationships (Cassidy & Shaver, 1999). For
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coresiding young mothers, the conflicting roles between
being a daughter and a mother may create patterns of
behavior that are unique to the coresidence context. This
may explain the different findings for the coresident and
noncoresident groups.
When the child is living with both mother and grand-
mother, the mix of caregiving influences may delay or dis-
rupt the organization of attachment as reflected in
children’s secure base behavior. The unexpected negative
correlations of grandmother security with child security
with the mother at 10 months may indicate that the grand-
mother’s presence delayed the child’s organization of
attachment behavior toward the mother. In other circum-
stances in which someone other than the mother provides
much of the caregiving, such as in a kibbutz community,
attachment has been found to be more inconsistent across
generations and more likely to be characterized as inse-
cure (Sagi et al., 1997). Children living in a kibbutzim
with communal sleeping arrangements, in which unfamil-
iar adults often cared for children during the night, had a
much lower incidence of secure attachment (55% secure)
and were less likely to have an attachment style similar to
their parents, compared with children living in a kibbutzim
community with family sleeping arrangements (80%
secure) in which mothers could provide more caregiving
for their infants. The lack of attachment style concordance
between parents and their children in the communal sleep-
ing kibbutz may reflect inconsistent caregiving patterns in
the infant’s experience that interfered with a simple trans-
mission of the mother’s attachment style to the infant. As
in the kibbutzim community, a child living with both the
mother and grandmother may also experience inconsistent
caregiving; the child may feel divided loyalties and may
often feel torn between the multiple authority figures in
the home. Inconsistent parenting may occur, and added to
that may be the insecurity of not knowing who to trust
most (DeToledo & Brown, 1995).
These qualitative results may explain why grandmoth-
ers’ and mothers’ related attachment security affected the
children in different ways. In response to the question
about who does the caretaking and disciplining of the
child, all three triads reported that the mother was respons-
ible for both the caretaking and disciplining of the child
more so than the grandmother was. This information sup-
ports the conclusion from the quantitative data that the
child’s attachment security is more strongly associated
with the mother’s own sense of security in close relation-
ships rather than with the grandmother’s sense of security.
This distinction between the mother and grandmother
roles emerging from the qualitative interviews suggests
that most of the caregiving interactions were between
mother and child. The influence from the grandmother
then, on the child’s developing sense of security and
secure-base behavior, would be more likely to be indirect
through the mother rather than through direct caregiving
interactions with the child. Interestingly, the correlations
suggest positive associations for security between grand-
mothers and mothers, and between mothers and children,
but not between grandmothers and children. These results,
considered together with the qualitative data, suggest that
the three-generation transmission of attachment is more
indirect than direct.
There are several strengths and weaknesses that
need to be addressed in this study. The major strength is
that there are so few studies that have examined the
topic of residential grandmothers and the cross-genera-
tional link with attachment security. The addition of
qualitative interviews with three of the mothers is an
additional strength while the timing of these interviews
is considered a limitation. These interviews indicate a
positive relationship between the mothers and grand-
mothers that has been established five to six years after
coresiding and may not be indicative of the relationship
during the coresidential period. Two of the dyads also
chose to have their interviews conducted together.
Although it was their choice, being interviewed in each
others’ presence may have limited the openness of the
interviews. These limitations could explain the lack of
continuity between the grandmother-mother security
scores for these three dyads.
Finally, sample size was a weakness of this study for
both the qualitative and quantitative measures. The ori-
ginal EHS study recruited 201 families, but only 57 of
those families reported the grandmother as a secondary
caregiver; additionally, a larger sample of qualitative
interviews would provide further understanding of this
relationship. The number of variables and the longitudinal
nature of the research questions made it difficult to com-
plete some analyses due to the small sample size.
American families are constantly changing and evolv-
ing. Some of the biggest changes over the past 40 years
have involved the family structure and living arrange-

ments. On the one hand, changes in the economy, divorce,
and marital instability, and the increased problems of pov-
erty and drug abuse have made it difficult for families to
provide the resources, support, and caregiving required by
family members (Bengtson, 2001). On the other hand,
Bengtson argued, multigenerational families are becoming
increasingly important, and that “multigenerational bonds
will not only enhance but in some cases replace nuclear
family functions.” (p. 2)
Future research needs to focus on the grandparent-
child relationship and grandparents as attachment figures
in general as well as on how grandparent-parent relation-
ships influence the intergenerational transmission of
attachment security. Research on alternative attachment
relationships such as with fathers, grandmothers, or
childcare providers could clarify the multiple pathways
of attachment formation. Qualitative studies such as this
one could also provide an enhanced picture of three-gen-
Downloaded By: [Utah State University] At: 23:14 25 January 2011
eration households and provide the contextual back-
ground information needed to better understand the roles
of coresiding mothers and grandmothers in a child’s
development. A better understanding of attachment rela-
tionships and intergenerational transmission of caregiv-
ing is especially important in our changing society when
caregiving is not always exclusively the role of the
mother.
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