Home > Encyclopedia of Psychology > Separation Anxiety

Distress reaction to the absence of the parent or caregiver.

Separation anxiety emerges according to a developmental timetable during the second half year in human infants. This development reflects advancing cognitive maturation, rather than the onset of problem behaviors.

As illustrated in the accompanying figure, infants from cultures as diverse as Kalahari bushmen, Israeli kibbutzim, and Guatemalan Indians display quite similar patterns in their response to maternal separation, which peaks at the end of the first year and gradually becomes less frequent and less intense throughout later infancy and the preschool years. This fact has been interpreted to mean that the one-year-old is alerted by the absence of the parent and tries to understand that...