Attachment
Outline and evaluate Lorenz and Harlow’s animal studies
AO1
- Lorenz – 12 fertilised goose eggs and split them into a control group
and an experimental group
- Experimental group – incubator – saw Lorenz first
- Control group – went through usual experience of hatching with the
mother goose
- Goslings would follow Lorenz even if they were put together with the
control group
- Calculated that there was a critical period of 32 hours in which
imprinting needed to occur
- Harlow – 16 Rohus monkeys with two model mothers
- Milk dispensed from wire mother and the monkey was scared
- The baby monkey cuddled the cloth covered monkey regardless of
which mother dispensed milk
- Showed that contact comfort was of more importance to the
monkey than food when it comes to attachment behaviour
AO3
STENGTH – EFFECTS OF MATERNAL DEPRIVATION
- Allowed us to learn about the possible effects maternal deprivation
and neglect can have on a child
- Harlow’s monkey showed serious and long-lasting consequences
- It would be unethical to explore these effects on human infants, so
findings help support Bowlby’s findings that neglect and lack of care
in the critical period of development is likely to have profound and
durable negative effects on the infant
STRENGTH – SUPPORT THE IDEA OF A CRITICAL PERIOD
- Supports Bowlby’s theory that attachment is an innate process and
must happen within the critical window of development in a child
- Allows practical application e.g., ensuring new-born infants have a
consistent attachment figure for the first two years of their life
- Has led to positive change to adoption policies and hospital
visitations polices reducing the chance of a child experiencing
disruption to their attachment to their attachment figure in early
years
LIMITATION – INVOLVES EXTRAPLATION OF FINDINGS FROM HUMANS TO
ANIMALS
- Animals are developmentally different humans
- Goslings are precocial whilst humans are altricial – means goslings
are born at a later stage of development than humans meaning an
attachment may form more rapidly than in humans
- Innate instinct could be different
- Results should be generalised to humans with care
, - However some argue that Harlow’s studies were more generalisable
to humans as both monkeys and humans are primates
Outline and evaluate the learning explanation of attachment
AO1
- Proposes that attachment is learnt rather than being an innate
tendency
- Classical conditioning suggests that attachment bonds are a result
of associating the mother with food
- Food is associated with pleasure and is an unconditioned stimulus
- The mother is the neutral stimulus and then becomes the
conditioned stimulus that evokes pleasure
- Operant conditioning is if the baby's behaviour results in an
agreeable consequence it is likely to be reinforced
- For example if crying results in feeding then the consequences are
pleasant and crying is repeated
AO3
STRENGTH – RESEARCH FINDINGS
- Schaffer and Emerson found that is specific attachment was not
casually formed until around six to seven months of age
- It is suggested that at this age only 3% of infants in their study
showed initial attachment to their father whereas 65% attached to
their mother
- At this time the study may have been accurate as the mother was
nearly always the primary caregiver
- The evidence suggests that the baby attaches to their mother in the
early months because they are feeding them and the child learns
who was most responsive to its needs
- However that study also found that 39% of the infants in their study
did not attach to the primary caregiver
- This would suggest that the baby may attach to the caregiver that is
offering them the most comfort contradiction the learning
explanation of attachment
LIMITATION – LACK OF SUPPORT FROM ANIMAL STUDIES
- Harlow’s study found that when given a choice the monkeys
displayed attachment behaviour towards the soft clothed mother in
preference to the wire mother that provided milk
- He found that the monkeys spent on average 18 hours a day on the
cloth monkey and only one hour on the wired monkey
- This contradicts the social learning theory and suggest that baby
seek love and comfort and security rather than its needs such as
feeding
- Therefore the explanation is reductionist as reducing attachment to
only S – R links do not reflect the complex nature of attachment
STRENGTH – ELEMENTS OF CONDITIONING
Outline and evaluate Lorenz and Harlow’s animal studies
AO1
- Lorenz – 12 fertilised goose eggs and split them into a control group
and an experimental group
- Experimental group – incubator – saw Lorenz first
- Control group – went through usual experience of hatching with the
mother goose
- Goslings would follow Lorenz even if they were put together with the
control group
- Calculated that there was a critical period of 32 hours in which
imprinting needed to occur
- Harlow – 16 Rohus monkeys with two model mothers
- Milk dispensed from wire mother and the monkey was scared
- The baby monkey cuddled the cloth covered monkey regardless of
which mother dispensed milk
- Showed that contact comfort was of more importance to the
monkey than food when it comes to attachment behaviour
AO3
STENGTH – EFFECTS OF MATERNAL DEPRIVATION
- Allowed us to learn about the possible effects maternal deprivation
and neglect can have on a child
- Harlow’s monkey showed serious and long-lasting consequences
- It would be unethical to explore these effects on human infants, so
findings help support Bowlby’s findings that neglect and lack of care
in the critical period of development is likely to have profound and
durable negative effects on the infant
STRENGTH – SUPPORT THE IDEA OF A CRITICAL PERIOD
- Supports Bowlby’s theory that attachment is an innate process and
must happen within the critical window of development in a child
- Allows practical application e.g., ensuring new-born infants have a
consistent attachment figure for the first two years of their life
- Has led to positive change to adoption policies and hospital
visitations polices reducing the chance of a child experiencing
disruption to their attachment to their attachment figure in early
years
LIMITATION – INVOLVES EXTRAPLATION OF FINDINGS FROM HUMANS TO
ANIMALS
- Animals are developmentally different humans
- Goslings are precocial whilst humans are altricial – means goslings
are born at a later stage of development than humans meaning an
attachment may form more rapidly than in humans
- Innate instinct could be different
- Results should be generalised to humans with care
, - However some argue that Harlow’s studies were more generalisable
to humans as both monkeys and humans are primates
Outline and evaluate the learning explanation of attachment
AO1
- Proposes that attachment is learnt rather than being an innate
tendency
- Classical conditioning suggests that attachment bonds are a result
of associating the mother with food
- Food is associated with pleasure and is an unconditioned stimulus
- The mother is the neutral stimulus and then becomes the
conditioned stimulus that evokes pleasure
- Operant conditioning is if the baby's behaviour results in an
agreeable consequence it is likely to be reinforced
- For example if crying results in feeding then the consequences are
pleasant and crying is repeated
AO3
STRENGTH – RESEARCH FINDINGS
- Schaffer and Emerson found that is specific attachment was not
casually formed until around six to seven months of age
- It is suggested that at this age only 3% of infants in their study
showed initial attachment to their father whereas 65% attached to
their mother
- At this time the study may have been accurate as the mother was
nearly always the primary caregiver
- The evidence suggests that the baby attaches to their mother in the
early months because they are feeding them and the child learns
who was most responsive to its needs
- However that study also found that 39% of the infants in their study
did not attach to the primary caregiver
- This would suggest that the baby may attach to the caregiver that is
offering them the most comfort contradiction the learning
explanation of attachment
LIMITATION – LACK OF SUPPORT FROM ANIMAL STUDIES
- Harlow’s study found that when given a choice the monkeys
displayed attachment behaviour towards the soft clothed mother in
preference to the wire mother that provided milk
- He found that the monkeys spent on average 18 hours a day on the
cloth monkey and only one hour on the wired monkey
- This contradicts the social learning theory and suggest that baby
seek love and comfort and security rather than its needs such as
feeding
- Therefore the explanation is reductionist as reducing attachment to
only S – R links do not reflect the complex nature of attachment
STRENGTH – ELEMENTS OF CONDITIONING
