AO1 - Romanian Orphan Studies

• Rutter (1998) studied Romanian orphans who had been placed in orphanages, aged 1-2 weeks old, with minimal adult contact.
• Rutter et al (2011) aimed to understand the impact that privation had on Romanian orphans.
• Rutter et al (2011) followed 165 Romanian orphans for many years as part of the English & Romanian adoptee (ERA) study.
• Rutter et al (2011) and the ERA study aimed to investigate the extent to which good, quality care could make up for poor early experiences in an institution.
• Physical, cognitive and emotional development was assessed throughout the ERA study, at ages 4, 6, 11, 15 and early 20s.
• A group of children from the UK adopted around the same time, made up the control group.
• When the Romanian children arrived in the UK, many showed signs of intellectual development.
• Romanian children adopted after they were 6 months old showed signs of disinhibited attachment.
• Romanian children adopted before they were 6 months old showed less signs of disinhibited attachment.
• Zeanah et al (2005) conducted the Bucharest early intervention (BEI) project with 95 Romanian children.
• Zeanah et al (2005) assessed attachment in 95 Romanian children aged 12-31 months old, who had been in institutional care.
• Zeanah et al (2005) compared Romanian orphans to a control group of 50 children and measured their attachment types.
• Zeanah et al (2005) used the strange situation to measure attachment types in Romanian orphans and the control group.
• Zeanah et al (2005) found that 74% of the control group were securely attached.
• Zeanah et al (2005) found that only 19% of the Romanian orphans were securely attached.
• Zeanah et al (2005) found that 44% of the Romanian orphans showed a disinhibited attachment.
• In Zeanah et al (2005) 44% of the Romanian orphans showed a disinhibited attachment compared to 20% of the control group.
• O'Connor (1999) found that orphans frequently showed disinhibited attachments.