Bowlby's Theory Of Maternal Deprivation Flashcards
Who proposed the theory of maternal deprivation?
Bowlby
What is the maternal deprivation theory based on?
Based on the idea that the continual presence of nurture/comfort/love from a mother (or mother-substitute) is essential for normal psychological (emotional and intellectual) development.
What is the difference between separation and deprivation?
• Separation is when the child is not in the presence of the primary attachment figure.
• Brief separations, especially those where the child has a substitute caregiver, are not significant for development.
• Extended separation can lead to deprivation.
• Deprivation occurs when a child loses an element of care from their primary attachment figure in the critical period and has serious consequences.
What is a critical period?
The first 30 months are a critical period for psychological development. If a child is separated from their mother for an extended period during this time and has no suitable substitute care they become deprived.
Explain what is meant by maternal deprivation. (3 marks)
Maternal deprivation is a result of extended separation and it occurs when a child lose an element of care from their primary attachment figure during the critical period. This will damage emotional and intellectual development.
What is the effect of deprivation on intellectual development?
Deprivation can lead to mental retardation, characterised by abnormally low IQ (2/more standard deviations from the mean – around 80 to 85 )e.g. Goldfarb (1947) found lower IQ in children who had remained in institutions as opposed to those who were fostered.
What is the effect of deprivation on emotional development?
Deprivation can lead to affectionless psychopathy, defined as the inability to experience guilt or empathy towards others. This prevents the development of normal relationships and is associated with criminality.
Why are affectionless psychopaths more likely to engage in criminal activity?
They lack guilt and empathy which stops most people from becoming offenders.
What was the aim of Bowlby’s 44 theives’ study?
Aim to investigate the link between affectionless psychopathy and maternal deprivation.
What was Bowlby’s procedure?
The sample consisted of 44 teenagers accused of stealing. The ‘thieves’ were interviewed for signs of affectionless psychopathy characterised as a lack of affection, lack of guilt about their actions and lack of empathy for their victims. Their families were also interviewed in order to establish whether the ‘thieves’ had prolonged early separation from their mothers. A control group of non-criminal but emotionally disturbed young people was set up to see how often maternal separation/deprivation occurred in the children who were not thieves.
What did he find?
• 14 of the 44 thieves were affectionless psychopaths, 12 of which had experienced prolonged separation from their mothers in the first two years of their lives. (In the critical period)
• 5 of the remaining 30 thieves had experienced separations. (Not affectionless psychopaths)
• 2 out of 44 in the control group had experienced separations.
-in the control group there were no affectionless psychopaths
What did he conclude?
Prolonged early separation/deprivation causes affectionless psychopathy. He concluded this as 12 out of the 14 thieves who were affectionless psychopaths had experienced prolonged separation in the critical period. 19 out of the 88 thieves had been separated and 12 developed affectionless psychopathy (the majority)
Explain two reasons which weaken this conclusion.
-not all those who were separated in the critical period developed affectionless psychopathy (only 12 out of 19 did, seven didn’t).
-Not all affectionless psychopaths had experienced prolonged separation (two did not)
Explain why it was important that Bowlby used a control group in his study.
The control group acts as a baseline for Bowlby to compare levels of affectionless psychopathy with, so he could be sure that it was maternal deprivation which was causing affectionless psychopathy.
Evaluation point 1:
(-) confounding variables
Bowlby used several sources of evidence for maternal deprivation including:
War-orphans who were traumatised and often had poor after-care.
This may lower the validity as it might be trauma and poor after-care which are causing later developmental difficulties rather than separation .
Evaluation point 2:
(-) Flawed methodology
The 44 thieves study had some major design flaws, most importantly researcher bias as Bowlby himself carried out the assessments for affectionless psychopathy and the family interviews. Biased responses may lower the validity as the thieves may give socially desirable answers so Bowlby’s measurement of affectionless psychopathy may not be accurate. The families may not remember periods of separation, so measurement of separation may not be accurate. Therefore the maternal deprivation hypothesis may not be accurate.
Evaluation point 3:
(-) Counter evidence
Lewis (1954) partially replicated the 44 thieves’ study on 500 young people. She found a history of early prolonged separation from the mother did NOT predict criminality or difficulty forming close relationships. This contradicts Bowlby’s maternal deprivation hypothesis so evidence is inconsistent meaning the findings are less likely to be correct.
Evaluation point 4:
(-) The idea of a critical period is inaccurate
Bowlby believed that prolonged separation inevitably caused damage if it took place within the critical period. However, later research has shown that damage is not inevitable suggesting that we should think of this early time as more of a ‘sensitive period’.
Koluchova (1976) reported the case of twin boys from Czechoslovakia who were kept locked in a cupboard and thus isolated from other people from the age of 18 months until they were seven years old. Subsequently, they were looked after by two loving adults and appeared to recover fully.
This suggests that critical period is incorrect and so the damage from maternal deprivation is not permanent (the idea of irreversible consequences is incorrect)
Describe one problem with this evidence
The twins may have formed an attachment with each other so they may not have been fully deprived therefore we cannot generalise this to other individuals so cannot be sure that the effects of deprivation are not inevitable.
Evaluation point 5:
(+) Support from animal studies
Levy et al. (2003) found that separating baby rats from their mothers for as little as a day had a permanent effect on their social development though not other aspects of development. This supports the link between deprivation and long-term effects on social development. It also shows the effects of deprivation are permanent, implying they are inevitable.
Describe two problems with this evidence.
-The study was conducted on rats and so we cannot generalise effects to humans
-It only gives evidence for the impact on social development and not intellectual etc therefore it gives limited evidence meaning it is incomplete
Evaluation point 6:
(-) Failure to distinguish between deprivation and privation
Rutter (1976) distinguished between deprivation and privation: deprivation refers to the loss of some element of care from an attachment figure; privation refers to an attachment never forming at all. He argued that when Bowlby used deprivation, he actually meant privation and thus the long-term damage Bowlby associated with deprivation was actually associated with privation. This means the link between deprivation and long-term consequences was incorrect and thus not valid (as the link should be with privation and long-term consequences)
How could we use this to Bowlby’s theory?
Change deprivation to privation in the theory E.G.maternal privation hypothesis.
