Primary care-giver debate Flashcards
Feeding – the mother SHOULD be the primary care-giver of an infant
The NHS recommends that if possible, infants are breastfed for at least the first six months of their lives.
Breastfeeding offers the healthiest start for infants. It protects them from numerous infections and diseases.
The NHS also claims that breastfeeding “can build a strong physical and emotional bond between mother and baby”.
This feeding argument means that the infant’s mother is the individual who is going to need to be available to feed the infant. Possibly every two hours.
This argument alone means that it’s practical and essential to the infant’s survival for the mother to be the primary care - giver.
This means anyone else (including the father) is limited to a supporting care - giving role.
Feeding – the mother SHOULDN’T be the primary care-giver of an infant
1950s - behaviourists promoted the view that infants were classically conditioned to associate their mother with a sense of pleasure.
Food (unconditioned stimulus) creates pleasure (unconditioned response).
The mother is associated with feedings and becomes a conditioned stimulus producing a conditioned response of pleasure.
Harry Harlow (1959)
Placed infant monkeys with two wire “mothers”.
One had a feeding bottle and the other was covered in soft cloth.
The monkeys spent most of their time on the cloth - covered ‘mother’. Clinging to this ‘mother’ when frightened.
This demonstrates that food doesn’t create an emotional bond.
Contact comfort does.
Schaffer and Emerson (1964)
Found that primary attachments weren’t formed with the person who fed or spent more time with the infant.
Strongly attached infants had carers who responded quickly and sensitively to their ‘signals’ and who offered their child the most interaction.
Deprivation damage – the mother SHOULD be the primary care-giver of an infant
Bowlby demonstrates that early and prolonged separation between a child and its mother can have lasting emotional effects.
Separation is likely to lead to an affectionless character:.
Such a character is more likely to become a thief is also likely to have difficulty forming relationships.
Bowly developed these views into the maternal deprivation hypothesis. “Mother love in infancy is just as important for a child’s mental health, as vitamins and minerals are for physical health.”
Bowlby identified a central role for the mother in healthy emotional development.
His initial ideas were based on his training as a Freudian psychiatrist.
Bowlby (1969)
Influenced by evolutionary theory and proposed that attachment to one caregiver has special importance for survival.
He called this one special emotional bond monotropy.
Monotropy
The concept that infants have an innate capacity and drive to attach to one primary caregiver or attachment figure.
Deprivation damage – the mother SHOULDN’T be the primary care-giver of an infant
Although Bowlby used the term “maternal” in the maternal deprivation hypothesis, he didn’t mean this was exclusively the child’s mother.
He wrote:
“A child should experience a warm, intimate and continuous relationship with his mother or permanent mother substitute - one person who steadily ‘mothers’ him.” (1953)
Further issue can be taken with the claim that such a relationship is indeed of crucial importance.
Bowlby et al (1956)
Presented research that some children show no ill effects from early separation.
The children in this study were ill with tuberculosis and spent years in hospital with little contact with their families.
Most of them showed few problems later in life.
Implications
One of the forms of support offered to parents is time off work following the birth of their infant.
Traditionally, this has only been offered to women in the form of maternity leave.
However, from April 2015, parents are entitled to “shared parental leave.”
This means that fathers and mothers can divide the 52-week entitlement as they see fit.
This change in social policy reflects how parents in the UK are moving away from the traditional view that the mother should be the primary care-giver of an infant.
Family and Childcare Trust
In March 2014, the Family and Childcare Trust reported that the average annual cost of sending an infant to nursery school full-time is £9,850.
UK Government
In March 2014, the UK government introduced a scheme that allows parents to claim tax relief on childcare costs, thereby incentivising parents to work.
The schemes are significant but there may be a greater cost to our economy if we’re unable to sustain an effective workforce.
Conclusions
The view of the mother being the primary care-giver is out of date.
There’s no conclusive evidence to suggest that the primary care-giver has to be female.
It mistakenly emphasises the fact that children have one primary carer.
The reality is that healthy development relies on multiple important relationships.
Bowlby proposed that there’s one primary attachment figure – but he also proposed that secondary attachments provide a vital emotional safety net for situations where the primary care-giver is absent.
Geiger (1996)
Research has also shown that, while women more often are the main emotional figure in a child’s life, men typically provide an equally important ingredient in development.
For example:
Fathers are more playful and physically active. Fathers are generally better at providing challenging situations for their children.
