P1 - Attachment Flashcards

Question

what is the difference between separation and deprivation

Answer 1

separation - A short term distancing from the mum deprivation - Deprivation is when the attachment is broken long term

Answer 2

suggests Mother love is as important for a child’s emotional development as vitamins are for a child’s physical development. Separations from the mother (or caregiver) when a child is within the critical period of 0 – 2.5 years of age causes emotional irreversible damage to the child and can lead to affectionless psychopathy (an inability to experience guilt or care about others). This prevents the person having normal relationships and is associated with criminality as they lack remorse for their actions

Answer 3

Maternal deprivation can also affect children’s intellectual development. If children were deprived in critical period, they would suffer mental retardation characterized by low IQ. This has been demonstrated by adoption studies, for example Goldfarb (1947) found lower IQ in children who had remained in institutions as opposed to those who had been fostered and thus had a higher standard of emotional care.

Answer 4

WHAT DID HE DO? Studied 44 criminal teenagers accused of stealing The families were also interviewed in order to find out if the teens had experienced prolonged separation from their mothers A control group of non-criminal emotionally disturbed children was also taken to see how often maternal deprivation had occurred in the group WHAT DID HE FIND? 14/44 could be described as emotionless psychopaths Of the 14, 12 had experienced prolonged separation from their mothers Of the control group Only 2 of the 44 had experienced long separations BOWBLYS CONLUSION: Prolonged early separation has caused affectionless psychopathy, supports emotional deprivation

Answer 5

Harlow also followed the monkeys who had been deprived of a ‘real’ mother to see if maternal deprivation had a permanent effect. Monkey’s reared with wire mothers were the most dysfunctional, more aggressive, less sociable and unskilled at mating. As mother’s some of the deprived mothers then neglected their young. Harlow suggested there was a critical period – a mother figure had to be introduced to the monkey within 90 days for an attachment to form – and after this damage done by early deprivation was irreversible

Answer 6

EVIDENCE MAY BE POOR – refer to 44 thieves and war orphans The children were orphans of the war in 1994 and therefore the research was of war orphans rater than normal orphans ISSUES WITH CRITICAL PERIOD - Rutter (2011) conducted a study on 165 orphans. When they first arrived in UK around half showed signs of mental retardation. If they were adopted before 6 months, mean IQ was 102, whereas after 2 years was only 77. Those adopted after 6 months showed signs of disinhibited attachment, symptoms including attention seeking and clingy behavior. However if adopted before 6 months, rarely showed these signs EXAGGERATION - He suggested that damage from prolonged separation was inevitable. Plenty of research suggests that whilst long-term damage becomes more likely, it is not inevitable. Robertson and Robertson (1971) took children facing short-term separations into their own home, providing them with an alternative attachment and found that this prevented severe psychological damage as seen with John. This shows if adequate care is provided we do not see the negative effects that Bowlby had suggested. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS - Bowlby’s MDH had a huge impact on post-war thinking about childcare. Langton (2006) Research enhanced understanding of negative effects – establishment of key workers in institutions Key workers spend one to one time with the child in an institution This did not occur before Bowlby's research FAILURE TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN DEPRIVATION AND PRIVATION - Rutter claimed that when Bowlby talked of deprivation, he was muddling 2 concepts together. Rutter drew a distinction between deprivation, loss of an attachment figure after attachment has formed, and privation, failure to form an attachment. The long term damage that Bowlby associated with deprivation is actually more likely to be a result of privation.

Answer 7

PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS - Bowlby’s MDH had a huge impact on post-war thinking about childcare. Langton (2006) Research enhanced understanding of negative effects – establishment of key workers in institutions Key workers spend one to one time with the child in an institution This did not occur before Bowlby's research

Answer 8

In terms of attachment it refers to children who grow up in an orphanage or children's home. Children raised in these environments often end up with a lack of emotional care which effects their ability to form attachments in life.

Answer 9

Disinhibited attachment is when a child shows equal affection to strangers as they do people they know well. Reactive attachment disorder is a condition in children who may have been neglected and did not form a healthy emotional attachment with their mother or other primary caregivers before age 5.

Answer 10

Background of Romania 1990 Aim: Romania 1990 studied 111 Romanian orphans adopted before 2 years and found that the sooner the children were adopted, the faster their developmental progress. Methods: Parental reports, a modified Strange Situation and investigator ratings On the back of the communist government there were many overcrowded orphanages Institutionally deprived adoptees were compared at 11 with children who had not been subject to institutional deprivation and who had been adopted in the UK before the age of 6 months Results: disinhibited attachment was strongly associated with institutional rearing but there was no significant increase in the relationship to duration of institutional deprivation past the age of 6 months. HOWEVER Only mild disinhibited attachment was more frequent in non-institutionalized adopted children If you are in an institution – you have likely suffered from maternal deprivation – outline the effects of this "Bowlby used the term maternal deprivation to refer to the separation or loss of the mother as well as the failure to develop an attachment." This is likely to happen to children in an institution as they are deprived of a clear mother or father figure. Because of how an institution works, children live a different life to that of a 'normal' one to one relationship that a parent and child would have in a home. This may lead to the failure or lack of ability to develop an attachment. Natural experiment: ongoing longitudinal study Compare development of Romanian orphans : 3 different groups FINDINGS: Negative long-term effects for the children HOWEVER Bowlby argued the critical period was 2 years but this study suggests it is actually more like 6 months

Answer 11

The case of the Romanian orphans was very severe and therefore we cannot generalize to the whole population of all orphans Methodological issues – children were not randomly assigned to conditions in the ERA study, as the researchers did not interfere with the adoption process. How might the children who were adopted early be different to the ones who were adopted later? This could have been a confounding variable It might be that the children who had higher IQ were adopted first because they had higher IQ rather than they had higher IQ after being adopted Evidence that negative effects can be overcome – Hodges and Tizard 65 kids in an institution since 4 months old They were either 'restored' (back to biological family) OR Sent off to a foster family Kids who are fostered have a better outcome than going back to biological family but both had problems forming friendships Conclusion: Early Privation has a negative effect on ability to form relationships

Answer 12

The continuity hypothesis is the idea that there is consistency between early emotional experiences and later relationships. More specifically children’s attachment types are reflected in their later relationships. This is based on the internal working model, as the early attachment provides a ‘model’ (template) for future relationships. For example, a child whose first experience is of a loving relationship from a reliable caregiver will assume that this is how relationships are meant to be. They would then seek out functional relationships without being too emotionally close (type A) or too controlling and argumentative (type C).

Answer 13

Youngblade and Belsky (1992) 30, 5 year old securely attached children were more curious, resilient and empathetic and were more likely to form close friendships. This supports the continuity hypothesis because the characteristics of the secure attachment type are carried over into later life where the children are able to form close friends and build 'secure' relationships with their friends.

Answer 14

Temperament : Innate part of your personality This alternative approach sits well with the idea of continuity but proposes that our initial IWM is a results of innate temperament rather than caregiver sensitivity and parenting.

Answer 15

Those who fail to have secure attachments in childhood are not necessarily condemned to a life of broken relationships Zimmerman (2000) longitudinal study found that early attachment style was not such a good predictor of later relationships and discovered that later life events such as parental divorce had a much greater impact. This contradicts the continuity hypothesis and says that it does not affect adult relationships.

Answer 16

Many attachment psychologists argue that early relationships with our primary caregivers have an effect on later relationships. The continuity hypothesis is the idea that there is consistency between early emotional experiences and later relationships, and it sees children’s attachment types being reflected in these later relationships. This idea is based upon the internal working model, which was proposed by Bowlby in his monotropic theory. Bowlby sees attachment as monotropic, where infants have an innate tendency to form an attachment to one particular person. This attachment is the strongest of them all, forming a model for future relationships, which the infant will expect from others. This is the idea of the internal working model; a template for future relationships based upon the infant’s primary attachment, which creates a consistency between early emotional experiences and later relationships. There are several attachment types that a child can develop in infancy. Ainsworth divided these into secure, insecure avoidant and insecure resistant, when working on her ‘Strange Situation’ research. Based on Bowlby’s predictions and research ideas of Ainsworth, Hazan and Shaver created a ‘love quiz’ experiment to explore the idea that there is continuity between early attachment types and the quality of later adult romantic relationships they conducted a study to collect information of participant’s early attachment types and their attitudes towards loving relationships. Of the volunteer sample, they found that those who were securely attached as infants tended to have long lasting relationships, on the other hand, insecurely attached people found adult relationships more difficult, tended to divorce, and believed love was rare. This supports the idea that childhood experiences have significant impacts on people’s attitude towards later relationships. The correlation between adult’s attachment style and their memories of parenting style they received is similar to Ainsworth’s findings, where children’s attachment styles were correlated with the degree of sensitivity shown by their mothers.. However, this theory has been accused of being reductionist because it assumes that people who are insecurely attached as children will become insecurely attached as adults and have poor quality adult relationships. As well as this, attachment types identified in the Strange Situation and used in Hazan and Shaver’s study relate only to the quality of relationship with one person. Therefore, an adult’s choice of description to their attachment style might only relate to their current relationships. An alternative explanation for continuity in relationships is the temperament hypothesis, founded by Kagan. He found that infants have an innate personality, such as being easy going or difficult, which influences the quality of their attachment with caregivers and in later relationships. This suggests that attachments form as a result of temperament and not an innate gene for attachment; which goes against Bowlby’s theory. This also suggests that attempts to develop better quality relationships by changing people’s attachment styles to more positive ones would not work.