4.1.3 ANIMAL STUDIES

Question 1

what are the two key animal studies in attachment?

Answer 1

• Lorenz: Imprinting in Goslings
• Harlow and Harlow: Love in Infant Monkeys

Question 2

what is ethology?

why’s it important?

Answer 2

• the study of non-human animals in order to learn more about humans
• very important in a study of ethology to consider how this relates to humans and what we learn about our own species from it

Question 3

what are the issues with animal studies?

Answer 3

• we can’t really apply to humans as we are more complex both socially and neurologically so it might not be appropriate to do this
• it’s unethical to study animals as it often involves keeping them in captivity / exposing them to harm
• when an animal is studied it causes them undue stress which could impact findings as well as being harmful to the animal
• findings need to be treated with caution as this may be influenced by the experimental setting (exp: natural study)

Question 4

what did HARLOW do and when?

Answer 4

HARLOW (1958)
- wanted to study the mechanisms by which newborn rhesus monkeys bond with their mothers

PROCEDURE
- baby monkeys were taken form their mothers when born
- two wire surrogate mother monkeys with different head (1 wire, 1 wrapped in cloth)
- they were placed with 8 infant monkeys
- 4 monkeys had the milk attached to the cloth wire monkey
- 4 had the milk attached to the plain wire covered monkey

Question 5

what do HARLOW find?

Answer 5

• observed how long the monkey spent with each ‘mother’
• they tended to spend most of their time with the cloth mother, only going to the wire mother to feed
• if baby monkey was scared it would cling to the cloth mother for support (contact comfort)
• used the cloth mother has a safe place to explore the cage

CONCLUSION
- concluded that infants needed comfort more than food for attachment

Question 6

what did LORENZ do and when?

Answer 6

LORENZ (1935)
- was an ethnologist who looked at the phenomenon of imprinting in goslings

PROCEDURE
- used 12 fertilised gosling eggs and divided them
- control group remained with mum until hatched
- experimental group were incubated and saw LORENZ as their first moving thing
- placed the marked ducklings together to show which had imprinted on the duckling’s mother and LORENZ and they quickly divided themselves up

Question 7

what did LORENZ find?

Answer 7

• the animals were exposed to LORENZ during the critical period of imprinting
• the geese followed the first moving object they saw, during the 12-17 hour critical period after hatching
• the LORENZ goslings were observed to follow him everywhere
• even as adults the goslings still sought out LORENZ as their ‘mother’

Question 8

what is imprinting?

Answer 8

• the idea that some species attach to the first moving object they see when they are born

Question 9

evaluate the positives of LORENZs study?

Answer 9

POSITIVES
- supported by research in regard to imprinting
eg) GUITON
-> used chicks and fed them with yellow rubber gloves on
during the critical period
-> they imprinted on the glove
-> suggest that young animals imprint on any moving thing
present during the critical period of development
-> chicks were later found trying to mate with the glove

• this links with the findings originally found in LORENZ’s study
• suggests the long-lasting effects, this is an irreversible change affecting social and sexual behaviour known as sexual imprinting
• then links to several ethical issues within both LORENZ and HARLOW due to irreversible effect it had on animals

Question 10

evaluate the negatives of LORENZs study

Answer 10

• there are criticisms of imprinting as the concept of imprinting within his study
• suggests the object leads to an irreversible situation on the nervous system
• HOFFMAN (1976)
  suggested that this isn’t an irreversible change
  further supported by GUITON which suggested that after spending time with their own species they were able to engage in normal sexual behaviour
  suggesting that imprinting is moderately reversible

Question 11

evaluate the negatives of HARLOWs study?

Answer 11

1) - experiments have been seen as unnecessarily cruel (unethical)
- of limited value in attempting to understand the effects of deprivation on human infants

2) - monkeys suffered emotional harm from being reared in isolation
- when places with real monkeys they huddled in a corner in a state of persistent fear and depression

3) - HARLOW created a state of anxiety in female monkeys
- when they became parents they became so neurotic that they smashed their infants face into the floor and rubbed it back
and forth
4) - confounding variable
- heads of the two wire monkeys varied significantly which acted as a confounding variable with the independent variable
- IV = whether the monkey is clothed or not

5) - findings lack internal validity due to the difference in monkeys heads
- could suggest the monkeys choose one wire monkey over the other as they preferred the physical appearance of one

6) - both experiments were on animals
- can they be generalised / applied to humans?

7) - found that infants weren’t predominantly attached to the person that fed them but the one who responded most
sensitively to their needs
- suggests his study on rhesus monkey isn’t valid in deterring attachment
- cognitive level of humans greatly exceeds that of animals
- meaning his findings cannot be generalised to humans