Karolina Dąbrowska Attachment, parenting & development Extra Assignment: Paper Review Gernhardt et al. (2016) "Children’s Family Drawings as Expressions of Attachment Representations Across Cultures: Possibilities and Limitations The paper by Gernhardt et al. (2016) presents a comparative exploration of children's family drawings as a tool for assessing attachment representations in different cultural contexts. Illustrations made by children from rural areas of Cameroon and middle-class Berlin were systematically analysed to draw conclusions about attachment quality and the influence of maternal socialisation goals. The study’s main strength is its contribution to the cross-cultural comparison of pictorial attachment representations against the background of culturally distinct socialisation goals. The disparities in children’s early experiences were analysed to uncover differences in the representations of the family and self. These informed the authors’ conclusion that attachment security may not be discernible from family drawings across cultures based on the same assessment criteria. This greatly enhances the current understanding of attachment expression and highlights the importance of cultural context. Furthermore, the design is characterised by considerable methodological rigour. The drawings were analysed with two standardised tools validated for use with children albeit mostly in the West. The authors enhanced the credibility of their conclusions by using blind coding. The general description of the procedure is detailed and ensures replicability. A notable weakness of this paper is a relatively limited overview of theory and past research presented within the introduction which does not provide a comprehensive background for the study. An in-depth exploration of previous results would certainly give the reader a clearer understanding of the state of knowledge within the field and emphasised the value and originality of the design. An additional limitation lies in the small sample size. Even though, the children were selected diligently ensuring the comparability of demographic characteristics between the groups, there may be doubt regarding the generalisability of the findings. The authors make strong assertions about the overall attachment security tendencies and goals of socialisation in each study population based on data obtained from around 30 participants respectively. The appropriateness of their conclusion may, therefore, be questioned. Future research could benefit from exploring a more diverse range of populations, the associated socialisation goals, and their overall possible influence on pictorial attachment representations to perhaps create a more unified and holistic theory about their exact relationship. Additionally, subsequent studies could revise and test the drawing analysis tools across different cultures to arrive at more appropriate criteria for attachment assessment. In conclusion, the paper provides valuable insights into the advantages and drawbacks of using family drawings as a tool to assess attachment representations across different cultural groups and creates interesting avenues to be explored by future studies.
