Disruption of attachment

Question 1

Bowlby’s theory suggests what?

Answer 1

attachment is essential for healthy social and emotional development

Question 2

How can distruption occur?

Answer 2

when an infant is separated from their attachment figure

Question 3

explain Robertson and Robertson’s study

Answer 3

John was placed in a residential nursery for 9 days while his mother was having a baby. His father visited regularly. During the first 2 days, John behaved normally. Gradually he begins to become attention seeking of the nurses but cannot compete with the more assertive children. When John cannot get attention from anyone he seeks comfort from a teddy. Over the next few days,he refuses to eat and drink, stops playing and cries a lot and stops trying to get the nurses attention. When his father visits John sits quietly and doesn’t say anything. When his mother returns to pick him up he struggles to get away from her and screams, for many months after he continues to have outbursts of anger towards his mother.

Question 4

What are the strengths and weaknesses of the Robertson and Robertson study?

Answer 4

Strength: high validity as they were naturalistic observations
weakness: only a few case studies and cannot generalise these finding

Question 5

what can help reverse the effects of short term separation

Answer 5

providing adequate substitute care can help reverse the effects of physical separation

Question 6

What did Skeels and Dye find out about long term separation?

Answer 6

prolonged separation caused children to perform poorly on intelligence tests, some of these children performed so poorly they had to be transferred to a home for mentally retarded adults. Once their IQs were tested gain, they were higher, why?Possibly because they received emotional care from the retarded adults.

Question 7

CONCLUSION: when is response to separation

strongest?

Answer 7

between ages of 12-18months

Question 8

CONCLUSION: how do we know the ages of which separation is strongest between?

Answer 8

Schaffer and Callender: studied babes in hospitals and found that children under 7 months showed minimal upset. After this ages the strength of the response increased up to around 18 months.

Question 9

CONCLUSION: why do securely attached children react better with short term separation?

Answer 9

maybe because they believe their mother will return

Question 10

CONCLUSION: which gender copes better?

Answer 10

boys

Question 11

CONCLUSION: those who have been left before are more likely to cope better with brief separation

Answer 11

they know the parent will return as they have been left before

Question 12

describe the Robertson and Robertson experiment to do with maintaining the emotional bond

Answer 12

3 children were placed in foster care for a few weeks with the Robertson’s while their mother was in hospital. The Robertson’s tries to sustain a high level of substitute emotional care and to keep routines as similar as possible. Fathers visits were regular. One of the children visited their mother in hospital and was more settled. When reunited with their mother they did not reject her, some were reluctant to leave the foster mother but this shows a good formation of an emotional bond,

Question 13

what did Spitz and Wolf do?

Answer 13

observed 100 “normal” children who were placed in an institution became severely depressed within a few months

Question 14

what did Skeels and Dye do?

Answer 14

did a study on orphans who had been transferred to a home for mentally retarded adults and compared their IQ’s to a control group

Question 15

what did Skeels and Dye find?

Answer 15

those in the control group had lower IQ’s than those in the home with the women

Question 16

give an explanation as to why Skeels and Dye found what they did

Answer 16

because the women were giving them the emotional care the children needed.

Question 17

Triggers, explain Bifulco et al.’s study

Answer 17

studied 249 women who had lost heir mothers before the age of 17. This group was twice as likely to suffer from depressive of anxiety disorders when they grew up.

Question 18

what does Triggers by Bifulco et al. suggest about early disruptions in attachment?

Answer 18

that they may make an individual more vulnerable and, if triggered by stressful events in later life, mental disorder may develop.

Question 19

INDIVIDUAL DIFF

Research has shown that not all children are affected by emotional disruption, explain what Barrett found

Answer 19

that securely attached children may cope reasonably well, whereas insecurely attached become especially distressed.

Question 20

INDIVIDUAL DIFF

A study by Bowlby et al. did what?

Answer 20

60 children under the age of 4 who had TB stayed in hospital for a long period of time. They were visited only once a week and the hospital could not provide sufficient substitute care. They then tested these children for adolescence.

Question 21

INDIVIDUAL DIFF

what did Bowlby et al. find?

Answer 21

some in the TB group were more maladjusted but there was no significant difference in intellectual development between them and a control group.

Question 22

INDIVID DIFF

why might Bowlby et al. have found this?

Answer 22

that those who coped better may be more securely attached and so more resilient.

Question 23

what is thr real world application of disruption of attachment?

Answer 23

that hospitals now allow the primary caregiver to stay with the child in hospitals