Grant: Operating Grant

Over forty years of research has demonstrated that insecure infant attachments (to parents) predict poor health outcomes across the lifespan, such as being diagnosed with serious psychiatric illnesses or chronic pain conditions. Being able to help lessen the impact of insecure infant attachments before they are set, would have a high potential for significantly impacting the health of Canadians. This grant aims to take the first step in this process by generating knowledge regarding how parents and infants interact over the first year of life during immunizations. Immunization pain triggers infant attachment behaviours because it triggers infants sense of danger and thus, the infants' need for parent. Caregivers and infants who have taken part in an ongoing research project will be invited to participate in the current study after infants attend their 12-month immunization appointments. During the original study, immunization procedures at 2, 4, 6 and 12 months were videotaped to capture infant pain-related behaviour as well as the way they interacted with their caregiver; these data will be utilized in the current analyses. The current study will then invite these caregiver-infant dyads to take part in a wellknown attachment assessment procedure called the Strange Situation Paradigm. By examining how an infant's relationship with his or her caregiver is related to how an infant reacts when in pain, this project will help us better understand how insecure infants act in a commonly occuring stressful situation. Ultimately, it is hoped that information created in this grant will be able to be used by health professionals, in the immunization context, to help lessen the occurence of insecure attachments and improve the health of Canadians at all ages.