Bowlby's Maternal Deprivation

Question 1

What is deprivation according to Bowlby’s theory of Maternal Deprivation?

Answer 1

Deprivation is where an attachment is formed between an infant and a caregiver but is broken later in life

Question 2

What was the aim of the 44 Juvenile Thieves study?

Answer 2

To see if deprivation was associated with affection less Psychopathy

Question 3

What was the 44 thieves study?

Answer 3

44 children who were criminals were interviewed as were their families to create a record of their early life experiences

Question 4

What were the results of the 44 Thieves study?

Answer 4

14 out of the 44 had affection-less psychopathy and 12 out of that 14 experienced deprivation

thus a Link between maternal deprivation and later social malajustments

Question 5

Evaluation points of Bowlby’s theory of Maternal deprivation?

Answer 5

• real-world application: parents could visit children in hospitals to avoid deprivation after further research
• The findings are correlations not causations and so it is unclear if we can truly establish any general law