Summarised, condensed, easy to understand revision notes containing only the REDUCED CONTENT for the 2022 summer paper for the attachment section
Includes:
Animal studies of attachment
Explanations of attachment
Bowlby's mono tropic theory
Ainsworth's 'Strange Situation'
Cultural variation...
Attachment
Animal studies of attachment
Lorenz’s Imprinting
research - Initially observed imprinting when he was a child and a
neighbour gave him a newly hatched ducking that then
followed him around
- Procedure
o Randomly divided a dozen goose eggs – half of the eggs
hatched with the mother goose in their natural
environment and the other half hatched in an incubator
where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz
- Findings
o The incubator group followed Lorenz everywhere
o The control group, who hatched in the presence of their
mother, followed her
o When the two groups were mixed up, the experimental
group continued to follow Lorenz and the control group
continued to follow their mother
- Conclusion
o Imprinting – bird species attach to and follow the first
moving object they see
o Identified a critical period of a few hours after hatching –
if imprinting does not occur within that time, Lorenz
found that chicks did not attach themselves to a mother
figure
Sexual imprinting
- Lorenz also investigated the relationship between imprinting
and adult mate preferences
- Observed birds that imprinted on a human would often later
display courtship behaviour towards humans
Generalisability to humans
- Although Lorenz’s findings have influenced our
understanding of human development, there are issues with
generalising findings from birds to humans as the
mammalian attachment system differs from that in birds
- For example, mammalian mothers show more emotional
attachment to their offspring than birds do, and mammals
may be able to form attachments at any time, although less
easily than in infancy
- This means that it is inappropriate to try to generalise any
of Lorenz’s ideas to humans
Some of Lorenz’s observations are questionable
- The idea that imprinting has a permanent effect on mating
behaviour has been questioned by researchers
- Guiton (1966) found chickens imprinted on yellow washing
up gloves would try to mate with them as adults, in line with
Lorenz’s predictions, but with experience they eventually
learned to prefer mating with other chickens
, Attachment
- Suggests that the impact of imprinting on mating behaviour
is not as permanent as Lorenz believed
Harlow’s - Worked with rhesus monkeys, which are much more similar
research to humans than Lorenz’s birds
The importance of contact comfort
- Harlow observed new-borns kept alone in a bare cage
usually died but they usually survived if they were given
something soft like a cloth to cuddle
- Procedure
o Tested the idea that a soft object serves some of the
function of a mother
o Reared 16 baby monkeys with two wire model ‘mothers’
o In one condition, milk was dispensed by the plain wire
mother
o In the second condition the milk was dispensed by the
cloth-covered mother
- Findings
o Baby monkeys cuddled the soft object in preference to
the wired one and sought comfort from the cloth one
when frightened regardless of which one dispensed milk
o Showed ‘contact comfort’ was of more importance to
monkeys than food when it came to attachment
behaviour
Maternally deprived monkeys as adults
- Harlow also followed monkeys who had been deprived of a
‘real’ mother into adulthood to see if early maternal
deprivation had a permanent effect
- Found severe consequences – monkeys reared with wire
mothers only were the most dysfunctional
- However, even those reared with a soft toy substitute did
not develop normal social behaviour – more aggressive and
less sociable and bred less than is typical, unskilled at
mating
- As mothers, some neglected their young and others
attacked their children
The critical period for normal development
- Like Lorenz, Harlow concluded 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
Theoretical value
- Findings have had a profound effect on psychologists’
understanding of human mother-infant attachment
- Importantly, Harlow showed attachment does not develop
as the result of being fed by a mother but as a result of
, Attachment
contact comfort
- Also showed the importance of quality early relationships
for later social development including the ability to hold
down adult relationships and successfully rear children
- Shows its vital for all of a child’s needs to be cared for, not
just physical
Practical value
- Has helped social workers understand risk factors in child
neglect and abuse and so intervene and prevent it
- Findings also important in the care of captive monkeys as
we now understand the importance of proper attachment
figures for baby monkeys in zoos and also in breeding
programmes in the wild
- Research is worthwhile in that it has important applications
in a range of practical concepts
Ethical issues
- The monkeys suffered greatly as a result of Harlow’s
procedures
- If the species is considered similar enough to humans to be
able to generalise the findings, it also means their suffering
was quite human-like
- Harlow aware of the suffering he caused – Harlow referred
to the wire mothers as ‘iron maidens’ (a medieval torture
device)
- The study was a breach of BPS conduct, may not tell us
about human attachment
- HOWEVER, it can be argued Harlow’s research was
important to justify the suffering
Explanations of attachment: learning theory
Learning - The learning theory emphasises the role of learning in the
theory and acquisition of behaviour
attachment - Dollard and Miller (1950) proposed caregiver-infant
attachment can be explained by learning theory
- Sometimes called a ‘cupboard love’ approach as it
emphasises the importance of the caregiver as a provider of
food
Classical conditioning
- Learning through association
- Food = UCS
- Being fed gives us pleasure = UCR
- Caregiver = NS
- When the same person provides food over time they
become associated with food
- The NS becomes the CS producing the CR response of
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