Building the self – internal working models

In this video, we do two things:

First, we describe the way in which infants build maps of interactions with primary caregivers and the way in which these are coded in the infant’s brain using procedural memory, which stores information on how to perform routine motor procedures such as walking and eating. This memory operates below the level of consciousness, and these memories or mental images of early interactions are as such unconscious.

We then describe the way in which these maps become the basis of the Internal Working Models described by Bowlby (1969/1982) and their role in enabling the child to anticipate and interpret the behaviour of other people, and plan a response.

Where the caregiver is experienced as a source of security and support, the infant develops internal working models in which they have a positive self-image and in which other people are depicted as being trustworthy and responsive. However, infants with non-attuned (Step 4.18: Glossary) caregivers internalise a less positive self-image in which they may feel unworthy of love and without agency (Step 4.18: Glossary); they may also represent others as either unpredictable, unresponsive or possibly punitive.

Infants who experience severely suboptimal parenting, such as maltreatment, build up working models of caregivers as unpredictable and rejecting; a source of comfort but also a source of distress. The sense of self is represented as unlovable, unworthy, capable of causing others to become angry, violent and uncaring. Other people are represented as frightening, dangerous, and unavailable. The infant’s predominant feelings are of fear, anger and shame, and the infant has little time for exploration or social learning as a result.

We conclude this video by describing research which suggests that in the absence of changes to caregiving, these attachment patterns are stable over time.