Maltreated Children in Out-of-Home Care: The Relation between Attachment Quality and Internalizing Symptoms

Maltreated children in out-of-home care are at high risk for poor relationships with caregivers (i.e., biological parents and substitute caregivers) and high levels of internalizing symptoms. It is unclear if these poor relationships are related to, and account for a large portion of the variance in maltreated children’s internalizing symptoms, above and beyond maltreatment type and out-of-home care factors. This study examined the relation between attachment quality with both biological parents and substitute caregivers and children’s internalizing symptoms within a sample of 493 maltreated children (aged 9–11; 51.0 % male) recently placed in out-of-home care. A series of hierarchical regression models indicated that greater child-reported attachment quality with both biological parents and substitute caregivers was associated with fewer child-reported anxiety (β = −.15, p <.01; β = −.29, p <.001, respectively) and depression symptoms (β = −.14, p <.01; β = −.28, p <.001, respectively) as well as fewer child internalizing symptoms (β = −.12, p <.05; β = −.14, p <.01, respectively). Attachment quality with the biological parent and substitute caregiver each explained a significant proportion of the variance in children’s internalizing symptoms, above and beyond child demographics, maltreatment type, and out-of-home care variables. The study also examined whether children’s attachment with substitute caregivers moderated the relationship between children’s attachment with biological parents and children’s internalizing symptoms. No statistically significant moderation effects were found. Future clinical work should focus on enhancing attachment quality between children and both biological parents and substitute caregivers, as these relationships appear to individually relate to the children’s internalizing symptomology.