ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on some of the research related to attachment that can assist social workers, family support workers, teachers, or therapists in their work with parents. It also focuses on our primary means of affecting the parent's attachment pattern–that is, our interactive/attachment pattern with the parent. Most important within this relationship is our attunement to the parent. The chapter considers how mindfulness and mentalization can have a positive effect on parents. It emphasizes imaging, which may be a new idea for some child professionals. The importance of the right hemisphere within attachment dynamics will lead our discussion to a more detailed description of the use of non-verbal interventions, with particular attention to imaging with parents and children and with parents alone. The chapter considers intergenerational transmission of attachment to address the perennial question as to whether the transmission of attachment is a nature or nurture effect.
