Harlow

Question 1

Harlow

Answer 1

• Harlow conducted study on attachment
• wanted to demonstrate that mother love was not based on the feeding bond between mother + infant
  = as predicted by learning theory

Question 2

procedure - Harlow

Answer 2

• Harlow created two wire ‘mothers’
• one mother was wrapped in a soft cloth
• 8 infant rhesus monkeys were separated from their mother at birth
• studied for 165 days
• they were placed in a cage w/ two wire mothers
• 4 received milk from the cloth mother
• other 4 received milk from the exposed wire mother
• during 165 days, recorded how much time they spent with each of the two mothers
• observed how the monkeys responded to being frightened by a mechanical teddy bear + coped w/ exploring a room w/ unfamiliar toys

Question 3

findings

Answer 3

• all 8 monkeys spent most of their time w/ the soft cloth mother
• monkeys fed by wire mother only got milk and then left
• when frightened, all monkeys clung to the soft cloth mother
• when playing, all monkeys kept one foot on soft cloth mother
• weren’t confident exploring unfamiliar room unless soft cloth mother was with them

Question 4

long term effects

Answer 4

• monkeys developed abnormally
• froze or fled when approached by other monkeys
• didn’t show normal mating behaviour
• didnt cradle their own babies
• they couldn’t recover since they spent more than three months w/ only a wire mother

Question 5

ad of Harlow’s study

Answer 5

• Schafer + Emerson also found that food is not necessary for attachment to form
• discovered that babies are often attached to people that play with them, rather than those who feed them
• in 39% of cases even though the mother was the one who fed the baby, the baby was more attached to someone else

Question 6

disads of Harlow’s study

Answer 6

• unethical
• non-human animals
• complex attachment

Question 7

unethical - disads of Harlow’s study

Answer 7

• study is considered unethical
• the monkeys were removed from their mothers = traumatic
• deliberately scared to see how they would react
  = led to long term emotional harm
  = when these monkeys were older, they fled or froze when encountering other monkeys
• also had difficulty caring for their babies as they’d not been cared for themselves

Question 8

non-human animals - disads of Harlow’s study

Answer 8

• problematic to extrapolate the findings from this study to attachment in human infants
• what applies to non-human species doesn’t necessarily apply to human infants
• humans are physiologically different from monkeys as well has other several influences that monkey’s don’t have
• e.g. culture, society, peers, upbringing etc..

Question 9

complex attachment - disads of Harlow’s study

Answer 9

• the attachment bond between human infants + their attachment figures is far more complex than it is in monkeys
• e.g there are several different attachment styes e.g. secure, resistant, avoidant