ATTACh
Memo
February
2006
RE:
“Report of the Taskforce on Attachment Therapy, Reactive
Attachment Disorder, and Attachment Problems” in the February
2006 edition of Child Maltreatment.
The
American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children (APSAC)
recently published the “Report of the
Taskforce on Attachment Therapy, Reactive Attachment Disorder,
and Attachment Problems” in the February 2006 edition
of Child Maltreatment. This report reviews the controversy surrounding
attachment therapy and parenting approaches and offers recommendations
for assessment, treatment and interventions. The release of this
report has and will continue to generate debate within the attachment
community. The purpose of this memo is to provide background information
on the taskforce and what role ATTACh played in the report.
In
2003 ATTACh became aware that Division 37 of the American Psychological
Association was forming a task force to study "recent deaths
attributed to unorthodox treatments for Reactive Attachment Disorder."
Todd Nichols, then President of ATTACh, contacted the Division
37 president to express his interest in participating on the task
force. The task force later migrated to APSAC. In 2002 APSAC dedicated
two special editions of their newsletter, APSAC Advisor, to the
issue of “Holding Therapy”. While some of the articles
were good, there was also much inaccurate or incomplete information.
All practitioners of "attachment therapy," not just
of coercive holding therapy, were painted negatively with a broad
stroke. APSAC subsequently invited Todd to participate on the
task force. After consulting with the ATTACh Board, he agreed
to do so.
Todd's participation helped ATTACh make progress toward two important
goals. First, ATTACh had received repeated feedback from the membership
about the need to create dialogue and collaboration with other
researchers and professional groups to increase ATTACh's credibility
and legitimacy. Also, the membership had repeatedly and strongly
urged ATTACh to take a proactive stand to combat pervasively negative
and inaccurate views of attachment therapy.
Todd's work on the task force consisted of participation in several
conference calls, one face-to-face meeting, and giving feedback
on report drafts. Todd's participation was very helpful in presenting
current information on the state of art practice in attachment
therapy. Many task force members were uninformed of advances in
the field and erroneously thought attachment therapy continued
to be synonymous with “rage reduction” and other coercive
techniques. This information helped taskforce members begin to
make distinctions between kinds of attachment work and see that
there were many practitioners whose techniques were informed by
research and truly represented new approaches. Information from
Todd helped them begin to consider the possible benefits of attachment-focused
therapy. Some task force members were more open to Todd's input
than others. The task force report was finally published in the
February 2006 edition of the journal Child Maltreatment, and the
full version is available at http://cmx.sagepub.com/current.dtl.
(See Recommendations by APSAC). While
not all of Todd’s recommendations were incorporated into
the final document, we believe his participation helped to improve
the content and tone of the overall document. For example, part
of the intro reads:
"Attachment therapy is a young and diverse field, and the
benefits and risks of many treatments remain scientifically undetermined.
Controversies have arisen about potential harmful attachment therapy
techniques used by a subset of attachment therapists.” This
caution is coupled with an acknowledgment that the needs of children
with extremely disturbed behaviors and their caretakers are real.
This
represents a critically important shift in the perception of attachment
therapy away from the universally negative beliefs that were the
catalyst for the taskforce. It does not represent a total victory
in that some misperceptions continue. Instead, we believe it is
an important first step in a meaningful dialogue with national
experts in the field of child maltreatment. It also represents
a challenge to the attachment therapy field to continue to articulate
the rationales and methodology of attachment therapy so that these
can be adequately evaluated.
We
believe it is in the best interest of ATTACh and its members to
continue to participate in such endeavors. ATTACh encourages its
members and the public-at-large to read
the report itself. (See Recommendations
by APSAC.) Some critics are grossly misrepresenting report
findings through sensationalized and distorted headlines. While
many of us may object to some of what is written in the report,
the task force report should be required reading for anyone engaged
in the business of treating children with attachment issues.
