Animal studies Flashcards
What are animal studies?
Studies carried out on non-human animal species rather than on humans, either for ethical or practical reasons - practical because animals breed faster and researchers are interested in seeing results across more than one generation of animals.
What did Lorenz investigate?
Imprinting- an innate need to attach to a living creature in order to survive.
Whereby bird species that are mobile from birth (like geese and ducks) attach to and follow the first moving object they see.
What were the procedures of Lorenz’s study?
Set up a classic experiment.
Randomly divided a large clutch of goose eggs.
Half the eggs were hatched with the mother goose in their natural environment.
The other half hatched in an incubator where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz.
What were the findings of Lorenz’s study?
The incubator group followed Lorenz everywhere.
Control group hatched in the presence of the mother, followed her.
After further experiments, Lorenz determined that imprinting was most likely.
When was it?
13 to 16 hours after hatching
What were the conclusions of Lorenz’s study?
Identified a critical period in which imprinting needs to take place, few hours after hatching (or birth) or it will not happen at all.
Explain the attachment in humans compared to imprinting.
It’s unlikely to occur in humans as it takes
longer to develop in humans rather than automatically attaching to particular things but what’s more important to humans is the quality care.
Describe the work of Lorenz into sexual imprinting.
He observed that birds that imprinted on a human would often later display courtship behaviour towards humans.
In a case study Lorenz described a peacock that was reared in a reptile house in a zoo where the first moving object they saw after hatching was a giant tortoise. It was found that as an adult the peacock would only direct courtship behaviour towards giant tortoises. Lorenz concluded that this meant the peacock had undergone sexual imprinting.
What is a strength of Lorenz’s research?
Research support for the concept of imprinting.
Regolin and Vallortigaro (1995) exposed chicks to moving simple shape combinations the chicks were found to be following original shape.
What is the limitation of Lorenz’s research?
Can’t generalise findings and conclusions to humans.
Mammalian attachment is more complex than birds.
In mammal attachment it’s a two-way process both the mother and child show an emotional attachment to their young.
What is the aim of Harlow’s research?
To test learning theory by comparing attachment behaviour in baby monkeys given a wire surrogate mother producing milk with those given a soft towelling mother producing no milk.
What were the procedures of Harlow’s research?
Two types of surrogate mother wire mother and a cloth mother.
16 baby monkeys were used.
In one condition a cage containing a wire mother producing milk and a cloth mother producing no milk.
Second condition cage containing a wire mother producing no milk and a cloth mother producing milk.
What were the findings of Harlow’s research?
Monkeys preferred contact with the towelling mother when given a choice of surrogate mother (regardless of whether she produced milk).
Used mother as secure base when frightened.
In adulthood maternal deprivation led to not developing normal social behaviour.
Were more aggressive and less sociable.
Bred less often.
When they became mothers, some of the deprived monkeys neglected their young and others attacked or killed their children.
What was Harlow’s conclusion?
Rhesus monkeys have an innate, unlearned need for contact comfort, suggesting that attachment concerns emotional security more than food. Contact comfort is associated with lower levels of stress and a willingness to explore, indicating emotional security.
Critical period for attachment formation is 90 days otherwise damage is irreversible.
What is a strength of Harlow’s research?
Real-world application.
It has helped social workers and clinical psychologists understand that a lack of bonding experience may be a risk factor in child development allowing them to intervene to prevent poor outcomes (Howe 1998). We also understand the importance of attachment figures for baby monkeys in zoos and breeding programmes in the wild.
