lesson 10 Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation attachments Flashcards
what is the maternal deprivation theory?
continual presence of nurturing from the mother or mother-substitute is essential for the normal psychological development of babies and toddlers
what is maternal deprivation?
being separated from a mother in early childhood
what is separation?
means the child not being in the presence of the primary attachment figure
what is deprivation?
they lose an element of the mother’s care
what is the critical period for psychological development?
30 months of life
what happens if the child is separated from their mother in the critical period?
psychological damage will be inevitable and lasting
what are the ways maternal deprivation is harmful?
intellectual development- very low IQ, many studies to support this claim
emotional development- become ‘affectionless psychopaths’ who have an inability to experience guilt or strong emotions for others, prevents the person developing normal relationships and is associated with criminality
procedure of Bowlby’s 44 thieves
44 criminal teenagers accused of stealing
all thieves were interviewed for signs of affectionless psychopathy
families were also interviewed in order to establish whether the teenagers had prolonged early separation from their mothers
control group of non-criminal but emotionally disturbed teenagers was used to compare if they had also suffered maternal deprivation
findings of Bowlby’s 44 thieves study
14 of 44 thieves 30% could be described as affectionless psychopaths
of this 14, 12 86% had experienced prolonged separations from their mothers during the critical period
the remaining thieves 30/44 only 5 had experienced separations
in the control group 2/44 had experienced long separations from their mother
evaluation of the maternal deprivation theory
evidence may be poor- Bowlby used a range of evidence to back his theory such as children orphaned during WW2 however this evidence can be seen as flawed since war-orphans were traumatised, could be psychological difficulties in their lives rather than separation
counter evidence- lewis replicated study with 500 young people and found that early separation did not predict criminality
effects of maternal deprivation are reversible- Kulochova reported case of twins boys who were isolated from 18 months to 7 years and they recovered fully after being looked after by two loving parents
failure to distinguish between deprivation and privation- privation failure to form an attachment which causes long term damage not deprivation
