Explanations for attachments: BOWLBY'S MONOTROPIC THEORY/EVOLUTIONARY EXPLANATION

Question 1

Evoloutionary explanation

Answer 1

• infants are innately programmed to form attachments with their caregiver
• these attachments must be formed within the critical period (0-2 years)
• otherwise an attachment will never be formed and this may lead to poor skills in adulthood

Question 2

Social releasers

Answer 2

• infants use social releasers to encourage the caregiver to attach to them e.g. crying, gripping, smiling etc
• purpose of these social releasers is to activate the adult attachment system (make an adult feel love towards the baby)

Question 3

Monotropy

Answer 3

infants form an attachment with one key caregiver
* he suggested that the attachment that is formed during infancy helps us develop our internal working model (IWM)

Question 4

Internal working model (IWM)

Answer 4

• describes the view that hold of ourselves and the way we believe other people view us
• based on this, Bowlby suggested that our infant attachments affect our our adulthood relationships
• this is known as the continuity hypothesis - law of continuity

Question 5

Law of accumulated separation

Answer 5

effect of every seperation from the mother ‘add up’ and the safest dose is therefore a zero dose

Question 6

Evaluation

Answer 6

+ Support from Harlow’s monkey research
- Reductionist
- Deterministic
- Multiple attachments
+ Evidence for internal working model

Question 7

+ Support from Harlow’s monkey research

Answer 7

• strnegth of Bowlby’s theory is that there is support from Harlow’s research
• infant mokeys spent more time with the comfort mother monkey because it provided safety and security
• e.g. when infant mokeys were presented with frightening objects they ran to comforter monkey
• study is in line with Bowlby’s monotropic theory
  - methodological flaws in Harlows research as he used monkeys so its low in ecological validity

Question 8

- Reductionist

Answer 8

• Bowlbys theory is reductionist
• theory suggests that infants form attachments due to innate programming
• infants are born with innate feature that can cause them to develop an attachment to their primary attachment figure
• however, this ignores other factors that may explain attachments such as nurture
• theory uses singular factor to explain attachments
• this lowers internal validity of Bowlby’s theory

Question 9

- Deterministic

Answer 9

• Bowlby’s theory is deterministic
• theory suggests that if an infant does not form an attachment during critical period then they will have poor social development
• not all individuals who fail to to form an attachment in critical period will have poor social development
• theory lacks external reliability becasue psychologists cannot be sure to obtain similar results, for all individuals across wider population

Question 10

- Multiple attachments

Answer 10

• evidence from Schaffer and Emerson shows that most babies attach to one person first, then they form multiple attachments later on
• opposes Bowlby’s theory because Bowlby believed infants only developed monotropic attachments

Question 11

+ Evidence for internal working model

Answer 11

• there’s evidence of IWM
• e.g. Bailey et al’s study of 99 mothers
• those with poor attachment to own parents were more likely to have one year olds who were poorly attached
• supports the continuity hypothesis