Bowlby's maternal deprivation

• Define the term deprivation-

  -That you had something and it was taken away from you

  -In this case, child has formed attachment with someone but that someone is no longer there
• How is deprivation different from separation?-

  -Separation means child not being in presence of primary attachment figure, only becomes issue for development if child is deprived

  -Brief separations are not significant for development, but extended separations can lead to deprivation
• Before Bowlby put forward his theory of attachment, he put forwards his maternal deprivation hypothesis .

  This focused on the idea that the continual presence of nurture from a mother or substitute as being essential for normal psychological development
• Critical period-

  -Bowlby stated that the first 30 months is critical (critical period) and if child is separated from its mother without a suitable substitute for an extended period of time that psychological damage was inevitable
• Intellectual effects of maternal deprivation-

  -Delayed intellectual development

  -Abnormally low IQ
• Emotional effects of maternal deprivation-

  -Affectionless psychopath (inability to feel remorse)

  >Prevents person from developing normal relationships and is associated with criminality
• 44 thieves study procedure-

  -Studied 88 children (44 criminals and 44 control group)

  -Bowlby interviewed them to look for signs of affectionless psychopathy

  -He interviewed families in order to establish whether 'thieves' had had prolonged separation from mothers
• 44 thieves study findings-

  -14/44 thieves described as affectionless psychopaths

  -12 of this 14 had experienced prolonged separation from their mothers during first 2 years

  -5 of the 30 remaining had experienced separation but showed no signs of affectionless psychopathy

  -Control group, 2/44 had experienced prolonged separation
• 44 thieves study conclusion-

  -It was concluded that prolonged early separation/ deprivation caused affectionless psychopathy
• Strength - Supporting evidence

  -Goldfarb found lower IQ scores in children raised in orphanages as opposed to those who had been fostered into family home

  -Those raised in orphanage had a mean IQ score of 68 compared to those who had been fostered who had a mean IQ score of 96
• Weakness - Other factors

  -Hilda Lewis replicated the 44 thieves study on a larger scale (500 participants).

  -In her sample early childhood prolonged separation didn't predict criminality

  -Suggests that there are other factors than just maternal deprivation
• Weakness- Privation and deprivation

  -Rutter (1976) argues that Bowlby muddled deprivation with privation and that long term effect associated with deprivation was more likely to have been caused by privation

  -Therefore, privation is when attachment has been formed