Learning Theory of Attachment

Question 1

What is attachment?

[3 marks]

Answer 1

Strong, eduring emotional relationship between 2 people (especially an infant and caregiver). A 2 way process that is characterised by a desire for closeness and a feeling of security when in the presence of the attachment figure.

Question 2

What is the assumption of Learning Theory?

Answer 2

All behaviour is learnt rather than innate - we are born blank slates

Question 3

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 3

• Food = unconditioned stimulus, being fed gives feeling of pleasure (unconditioned response)
• Caregiver starts as the NS - child hasn’t learnt to react to them in anyway
• When caregiver provides food over a long period of time (they occur together). After repeated feedings caregiver becomes associated with the food
• After learning the mother becomes the CS and she elicits the same response of pleasure (CR) without the presence of food
• According to LT, baby has become attached

Question 4

What is operant conditioning?

Answer 4

• Behaviour is learnt and repeated due to consequences
• In case of attachment, hunger acts as a drive (a feeling of discomfort that motivates behaviour)
• This leads to babies engaging in behaviour like crying in an attempt to reduce the drive
• Crying may lead to a child being fed which will reduce the hunger and lead to drive reduction
• In this case, the food is the reward and acts as a primary reinforcer - the actual object that reduces the drive
• Futhermore, the child recognises the person who provides the food as a secondary reinforcer AKA the agent of drive reduction
• Process repeats - child becomes attached to the mother as she is the source of reward

Question 5

What is a strength?

Answer 5

• A strength of LT is that it has practical applications
• LT’s explanation that feeding behaviour allows for the formation of attachment (e.g. through associating the caregiver with the pleasure provided by food) can be used to allow BOTH parents to form an attachment with the infant
• For the father this can be used to achieved by feeding the infant expressed or formula milk
• This is a strength as it means that both parents can look after the infant by themselves which creates a lot more flexibility in the ways families can arrange child care and parental leave from work
• This demonstrates how LT has utility and can improve lives

Question 6

How do Schaffer and Emerson weaken the theory?

Answer 6

• A weakness of LT is that there is refuting evidence
• Schaffer and Emerson’s study shows that attachments tended to be strongest with the caregiver who was most interactive and sensitive to the infant’s social releasers NOT whoever fed them most
• In fact, some children had multiple attachments even though the mothers may have done more feeding
• This is a weakness because it shows that food isn’t the key factor in determining attachment but rather social sensitivity.
• This decreases validity of LT

Question 7

How does Bowlby’s theory weaken LT?

Answer 7

• A weakness of LT is that there is a more well-rounded alternative explanation
• LT does explain the mechanisims behind HOW attachments form (e.g. through associating pleasure from food to caregivers), but it fails to explain the purpose behind attachment
• Whereas Bowlby’s theory explains both HOW and WHY attachments form
• In terms of how, he argues the mechanism is based on social sensitivity
• In terms of why, it is to ensure the infant’s survival and the passing on of genes to the next generation for the parent
• This is a weakness because it shows that LT only provides a partial explanation of attachment and thus Bowlby’s theory is more complete
• Thus LT decreases in validity

Question 8

How is animal research a weakness?

Answer 8

• A weakness of LT is that there is refuting evidence from animal research
• Harlow showed that food doesn’t lead to an attachment as the monkeys sought contact comfort and formed lasting attachments with the towel mother instead of the food providing wire mother
• Lorenz found that geese imprinted and thus attached to the first moving thing they saw regardless of if it fed them
• This is a weakness because it shows that associating the pleasure from food to the caregiver or noticing that the caregiver reduces the (hunger) drive is NOT KEY for attachment
• But rather it’s based on contact comfort and imprinting
• This decreases the validity of LT