PSYCHOLOGY IAL UNIT 3 EDEXCEL

EVALUATION OF BOWLBY'S EVOLUTIONARY THEORY

+ Harlow's monkeys - 16 rhesus monkeys seperated from mothers - surrogate mothers one of wire and one with toweling cloth. Found monkeys went to clothed monkey for comfort even though wire mother had milk. = supports that attachment is adaptive + Konrad Lorenz - Goose chicks to have a critical period - chicks who saw him first followed him as if he was the mother + REAL LIFE application - Now parents can get to sleep in the same room as their child in child hospitals and rearrange visiting hours + Support for IWM - Hazen and Shaver used a love quiz and foun dout that theres a strong relationship between childhood attachment type and adult attachment type: Secure attachment = happy and believed in lasting love. Insecure attachment = felt jealous, possessive. - Bowlbys work is based on animals - cant be generalised - extrapolating - Monotropy is socially sensitive - makes working mothers feel guilty - has major implications - Schaffer and Emerson found children able to form multiple attachments - refutes monotropy

Evaluation of Strange Situation theory

+ High internal validity - lab - standarised procedures - Low pop validity - ethnocentric - cant be applied to other cultures ( used white middle class women) - Lacks reliability - observations made by different people - results not consistent + HOWEVER: used inter-rate reliability Lacks ecological validity - lab - artificial setting -results not similar to real life situations - unethical - causes distress to children ( Other evaluation points include the cross - cultural research evidence)

Bowlby's maternal deprivation hypothesis

A warm intimate and continuous relationship must be formed with the child and caregiver during their critical period - if this is failed to form the child may experience emotional maladjustment in the future

CLASSIC STUDY FOR CROSS CULTURAL RESEARCH IJZENDOORN AND KROONENBERG (1988)

AIM: To identify different attachment types across cultures with the 3 main attachments applied and look at both intracultural differences and intercultural differences METHOD: Meta-analysis of 32 studies from 8 countries - used 1990 SSP classifications. Attachment types coded A,B,C. Studies that involved special groups (down syndrome etc) and children under 24 months were excluded FINDINGS: Found fewer type C's (Insecure avoidant) and more type A's (Insecure resistant) in four european countries however Secure attachment type B was most common type in all cultures but lowest in China and highest in Great Britain found significant difference in inter and intracultural differences (INTRA greater by 1.5X than intercultural) Inter + Intracultural comparison showed one of German sample was different from another German sample v

Bowlby's evolutionary theory

Based on Bowlby's 44 Juvenile thieves study ASCMI! A - Attachment is adaptive : Believes children are more likely to survive if kept safe S- Social releases of an infant (physical : their cute baby face features - behavioural : 'cooing/ crying') which attracts the adult to the child = attention C - Critical Period : Important time for a child to form an attachment with caregiver - failure to do so will effect the childs future negatively M - Monotropy : Infant forms one special attachment with mother - if the mother isnt available then any other primary caregiver I - Internal Working Model - Through monotropic attachment infant would form an IWM - Special schema for relationships = Future relationships would be impacted by this

EVOLUTIONARY THEORY

Believes a tendency to form an attachment is innate

DEPRIVATION

Disruption or sudden loss of an attachment during critical period (2-3 years)

PRIVATION

Failure to form any sort of attachment during critical period - can be due to poor parenting or child raised in isolation

Mary Ainsworth Strange situation study

Hypothesis: Attachment type is consistent from child to adulthood Based her theory on her USA Baltimore study - 26 mothers used and 106 infants Behaviours measured = Stranger Anxiety Separation Anxiety Reunion behaviour

Strange Situation procedure

Mother and are greeted in a room parent sits while infant plays stranger enters and talks to parent parent leaves whilst infant plays - stranger offers comfort for infant Parent returns - greets infant and offers comfort - stranger leaves Parent then leaves - infant is alone Stranger enters and offers comfort then parent returns - greets infant and offers comfort

Attachment Types found

Secure attachment : happy and have cooperative interactions with caregiver and are easy to calm down STRANGER ANX: High SEPERATION ANX: Low WILLING TO EXPLORE: High REUNION BHVR: Positive and happy when caregiver returns Insecure avoidant: Avoid any type of social interaction STRANGER ANX: Low SEPERATION ANX: Low WILLING TO EXPLORE: High REUNION BHVR: Shows little interest when caregiver returns Insecure resistant: Both seek and reject intimacy and social interaction STRANGER ANX: High SEPERATION ANX: High WILLING TO EXPLORE: Low REUNION BHVR: May resist contact on return of caregiver and be difficult to comfort Disoragnised: Lack of consistent patterns of social behaviour - child lacks coherent strategy for dealing with stress of separation