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Question

Lorenz's Research: Procedure

Answer 1

First observed imprinting when he was a child and a neighbour have him a newly hatched duckling that then followed him around Research: - Randomly divided a clutch of goose eggs - Half the eggs were hatched with the mother goose in the natural environment - Other half in an incubator where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz

Answer 2

Early 20th century

Answer 3

Understand mother-infant attachment

Answer 4

- Incubator group followed Lorenz everywhere - Control group hatched in the presence of their mother, followed her - When the two groups were mixed up the control group continued to follow the mother and the experimental group followed Lorenz - Imprinting = bird species which are mobile from birth attach to and follow the first moving object they see - Lorenz identified a critical period in which imprinting needs to take place. Can be within a few hours of birth/hatching - If imprinting does not occur within that time, Lorenz found that chicks did not attach themselves to a mother figure

Answer 5

Birds that had imprinted on a human would often later display courtship behaviour towards humans In a case study Lorenz (1952) described a peacock that had been reared in the reptile house of a zoo where the first moving objects the peacock saw after hatching were giant tortoises. As an adult this bird would only direct courtship behaviour towards giant tortoises. Lorenz concluded he had undergone sexual imprinting

Answer 6

Attachment of monkeys

Answer 7

Harlow observed that newborn rhesus monkeys kept alone in a bare cage usually dies but that they usually survived if given something soft like a cloth to cuddle. Research: - Reared 16 baby monkeys with two wire model 'mother' - In one condition milk was dispensed by the plain wire mother - In a second condition the milk was dispensed by the cloth-covered mother

Answer 8

- Baby monkeys cuddles the soft object in preference to the wire one and sought comfort from the cloth one when frightened regardless of which dispensed milk - This showed that 'contact comfort' was of more importance to the monkeys than food when it came to attachment behaviour

Answer 9

Harlow and colleagues also followed the monkeys who had been deprived of a 'real' mother into adulthood to see if this early maternal deprivation had a permanent effect. The researchers found severe consequences. - The monkeys reared with wire mothers were the most dysfunctional - However, even those reared with a soft toy as a substitute did not develop normal social behaviour. They were more aggressive and less sociable than other monkeys - Bred less often, typically of monkeys being unskilled at mating - As mothers, some of the deprived monkeys neglected their young and others attacked their children, sometimes killing them

Answer 10

Like Lorenz, Harlow concluded that there was a critical period. A mother figure had to be introduced to an infant monkey within 90 days for an attachment to form. After this time, attachment was impossible and the damage done by early deprivation became irreversible.

Answer 11

Mammalian attachment system is quite different to that from birds. Mammalian mothers show more emotional attachment to young than birds do, and mammals may be able to form attachments at any time, albeit less easily than in infancy. Cannot generalise any of Lorenz's ideas to humans.

Answer 12

His belief that imprinting has a permanent effect on mating behaviour. Guiton et al (1966) found that chickens imprinted on yellow washing up gloves would try to mate with them as adults (as Lorenz predicted) but that with experience they eventually learned to prefer mating with other chickens. This suggests that the impact of imprinting on mating behaviour is not as permanent as Lorenz believed.

Answer 13

Profound effect on Psychologists understanding on mother-infant attachment. - Shown attachment does not develop as result of being fed by mother but as a result on contact comfort - Importance of the quality of early relationships for later social development including ability to hold down adult relationships and successfully rear children

Answer 14

- Helped social workers understand risk factors in child neglect and abuse and so intervene to prevent it - Important in care of captive monkeys - understand the importance of proper attachment figures for baby monkeys in zoos and also in breeding program in the wild

Answer 15

- Monkeys suffered greatly as a result of Harlow's procedures - This species is considered similar enough to humans to be able to generalise the findings, which also means that their suffering was presumably quite human-like - Harlow himself was aware of suffering caused. He referred to the wire mothers as 'iron maidens' after a medieval torture device

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