Examining the relationship between child maltreatment and severity of attachment difficulties among children five years of age and older

The target population in this study were foster or adoptive parents who were caring for a child who had experienced CM and/or disruptions in a primary caregiver. Participants (N = 223) were categorized as caring for a child who had a history of CM and/or disruptions in a primary caregiver before/by age 5 or as caring for a child who had a history of CM and/or disruptions in a primary caregiver after age 5. Participants were administered the Attachment Disorder Assessment Scale-revised to assess for the presence of AD among the children that they were caring for. Two separate between groups ANOVAs were conducted to examine the differences between the scores on the ADAS-R (dependent variable) for those participants caring for a child who had 1) a history of CM before/by age 5 vs. after age 5 and/or 2) disruptions in a primary caregiver before/by age 5 vs. after age 5 (independent variable). Results indicated that those children who were older than 5 when they experienced CM and/or disruptions in a primary caregiver actually had more substantial AD than those children who had these experiences by/before age 5.