Romanian Orphan Studies: Insititutionalisation Flashcards
What are orphan studies
Studies based off of orphanages children who are placed in care because their parents cannot look after them (parents either died or abandoned them )
What did the idea of orphan studies originate from
Studying the effects of deprivation
What does orphan studies allow us to look into
Effects of institutional care and consequent institutionalisation that rose in Romania in 1990s
How did the Romanian orphanage issue come about
Many Romanian parents could not afford to keep their children and so they ended up in huge orphanages which were in poor conditions
How many researches on orphan studies were conducted
2
Who were the 2 researchers for the researches on orphan studies
Rutter and Zeanah
What was the procedure for Rutters research
Him and his group followed a group of 165 Romanian orphans for many years. These orphans were adopted by families in the UK. Physical, cognitive and emotional development has been assessed at ages 4 6 11 15 and 22-25 years. A control group was made from 52 adopted students from the uk
What was the aim of Rutters study
To investigate the extent to which good care could make up for poor early experiences in institutions
What were the findings of Rutters study (excluding attachment)
.half of the adoptees showed signs of delayed intellectual development
.majority malnourished
.different rates of recovery that were related to their age of adoption
.IQ differed depending on age and the same differenced remained age 16
.adhd was more common in 15- 22-25 age sample
What were the findings of Rutters study (attachment)
.a difference in outcome was shown on whether adoption took place before or after 6 months
.adopted after 6 months showed disinhibited attachment
.those before 6 months rarely showed disinhibited attachment
What are the symptoms of disinhibited attachment
Attention seeking, clinginess and social behaviour directed indiscriminately to all adults
What was the procedure of Zeanahs research
.conducted the Bucharest Early Intervention project
.assessing attachment in 95 Romanian children aged 12-31 months who have been living most of their lives in care
.compared to a control group of 50 children who have never lived in an institution
.attachment type was measured using strange situation
.carer were asked about unusual social behaviours
What ere the findings of Zeanahs research
.74% of the control group were classes as securely attached
.19% of the institutional group were classed as securely attached
.44% of institutionalised children followed the description of disinhibited attachment
.less than 20% of the control group followed the characteristic of disinhibited attachment
What type of attachment do those who spent their early lives in an institution often show
Disinhibited attachment
What is disinhibited attachment
Being equally friendly and affectionate towards familiar people and strangers and this is unusual since most children’s how stranger anxiety in their second year
What did rutter say about the adaptation with disinhibited attachment
disinhibited attachment is an adaptation to living with multiple caregivers during the sensitive period for attachment formations
Does quality in caregivers matter when figuring out attachment types
Yes because you could have 50 carers (like in Romania) but not spend enough quality time with any of them so there is no secure attachment formed
What did Rutters research show in terms of the intellectual disability
.when first arrived in uk most showed signs of intellectual disability
.however most of those adopted before 6 months, caught up to the control group by the age of 4
What is the strength of Romanian orphan studies (without counterpoint)
Application to improve conditions for children growing up outside their family home. Improved psychologists understanding on the effects of early institutional care an how to prevent worst of these effects. Improvements in childcare conditions. Institutional care is now an undesirable option and foster or adoption is seen to be better.
What is an other strength of Romanian orphan studies (with counterpoint)
Lack of confounding variables. Many other orphan studies were available from the past before the Romanian one however they had many confounding variables such as trauma due to world wars ect.. With the romanian one, they were handed by loving parents as they couldn’t afford to keep them. High Internal Validity
What was the counterpoint of the strength on the lack of confounding variables
They might have introduced different confounding variables. The quality of the care in the institutions were extremely poor s maybe the harmful effects are from the poor institutional care rather than the institutional care itself
What is a limitation of Romanian orphan studies
Lack of data on adult development. We don’t have current data to answer some of the questions about long term effects on early institutional care. It takes long to gather this data because of the longitudinal design of this study. This means it will take some time before we know what the long term effects are
