Investigation of the relationship between attachment styles and resilience of preschool children

In this study, it was aimed to examine the relationship between attachment styles and resilience of preschool children. In the study, it was examined whether children's attachment styles and resilience differ according to the following variables: age, gender, duration of attending pre-school education, mother's state of education, father's state of education, mother's employment status, family type, monthly income, number of siblings, birth order, the person(s) who take care of the 0-2 year old child. The population of the research consists of children in the 5-6 age group with normal development who attend the official pre-school education institutions affiliated to the Ministry of National Education in the Küçükçekmece district of Istanbul in the 2021-2022 academic year. The sample group consists of 361 children with normal development, their parents and 73 teachers in 15 pre-school education institutions selected by random sampling method from this population. In the study, Personal Information Form was used to determine the demographic characteristics of the children, the Incomplete Stories with a Doll Family to determine the attachment styles, and the Preschool Period Resilience Scale Parent and Teacher Form was used to measure their resilience. Since the scale scores showed normal distribution, parametric tests were used in the analysis of the data. In the comparison of two groups, t-test was used for independent samples, and in the comparison of three or more groups, One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used. In case of significance, Scheffe test was used if the distribution of variances was homogeneous for pairwise comparisons, and Tamhane's T2 test was used if it was not homogeneous. Relationships between attachment and resilience and its sub-dimensions were determined by Pearson correlation analysis. The relationship between the dependent and independent variable was examined by simple linear regression analysis. Robust regression analysis was used for the total score of T-PPRS, since the residuals were not normally distributed and there were outliers. Of the 5-6 year-old children who participated in the study; 69.3% were found to have avoidance attachment style, 19.7% were found to have secure/open, while 11.1% were found to have negative attachment style. In the study, it was determined that there was a positive and significant relationship between preschool children's attachment styles and resilience (self-regulation/social competence, understanding/expressing emotions, and empathy/responsibility sub-dimensions). It was determined that children's attachment styles positively predicted all sub-dimensions of their resilience.