Attachment Relationships and Educational Attainment: Is Intrinsic Motivation the Mediating Factor?

The attachment relationship is the first context in which infants learn through interaction with another human being.

Psychological theory has suggested that a positive early attachment may provide a secure base where the child's needs are met, giving them the security and freedom to explore the world and thereby to learn and develop.

This thesis further evaluates potential links between the security of attachment relationships and educational achievement.

The systematic literature review explores attachment to parent/carer and educational attainment in young people aged up to eighteen.

Despite some mixed findings, available evidence does not support a strong association between attachment security and educational attainment.

A significant methodological limitation was that few studies employed high-quality techniques to assess attachment (assessment tools with proven high reliability and validity).

Consequently further studies to fill this gap in the evidence base are recommended.

The empirical paper suggests that positive attachments will be linked to greater intrinsic academic motivation, leading to greater academic progress.

Electronic self-report questionnaires were administered to 375 year eight students, evaluating their perceived attachments to a parent, a peer and a member of school staff and their intrinsic motivation.

This quantitative study employed path analysis models to explore these variables.

Results indicated that attachment relationships had a small influence on academic progress. Intrinsic motivation was shown not to be the mediating factor.

The majority of findings were non-significant and those that achieved significance showed very small effect sizes.

The study concludes that the theorised influences of attachment and intrinsic motivation on academic progress are not supported.