Romanian Orphan Studies: Effects of Institutionalisation

• Institutionalisation


  placed dedicated to a particular task, such as looking after children awaiting adoption, or caring for mentally ill e.g. hospital

  an institution is a place where people live for a long period of time as opposed to daycare
• Study - Rutter


  AIM: test to what extent good care could makeup for poor early experience in institutions

  PROCEDURE: physical, cognitive and emotional development has been assessed at ages 4,6,11 + 15yrs

  group of 52 British children adopted around same time have served as control group

  FINDINGS: when first arrived in UK, half the adoptees showed signs of intellectual disabled and majority were severely undernourished

  at age 11 adopted children showed differential rates of recovery were related to their age of adoption

  means IQ of children adopted before 6 months was 102, between 6 months and 2yrs was 86 and after 2yrs was 77

  CONCLUSION: children adopted after they were 6 months showed signs of a particular attachment style, disinhibited attachment

  symptoms include attention seeking, clinginess + social behaviour directed discriminately towards all adults
• Study - Bucharest Early Intervention Project - Zeanah et al

  PROCEDURE: Zeanah et al assessed attachment in 95 children aged 12-31months who had spend most of their lives in institutional care

  were compared to a control group of 50 children who had never lived in an institution

  carers were asked about unusual social behaviour including clingy, attention-seeking behaviour, directed inappropriately at all adults

  FINDINGS: 74% of control group came out as securely attached

  19% of institutional group were securely attached, with 65% classified with disorganised attachment

  description of disinhibited attachment applied to 44% of institutionalised children as opposed to less than 20% of controls
• Disinhibited attachment


  typical effect from being in an institution

  children are equally friendly + affectionate towards people they know and strangers - highly unusual behaviour as most children in their 2ndyr show stranger anxiety

  Rutter - disinhibited attachment is an adaption to living with multiple caregivers during sensitive period for attachment formation

  in Romanian institutions, a child might have 50 carers, none of whom they see enough to form a secure attachment
• Intellectual disability


  in Rutter's study, most children showed signs of intellectual disability when they arrived in Britain

  most of those adopted before they were 6 months caught up with the control group by age 4
• Strength - real life application

  studying Romanian orphans has enhanced our understanding of effects of institutionalisation

  results have led to improvement in way children are cared for in institutions (Langton)

  e.g. orphanages and children's homes now avoid having large numbers of caregivers for each child and instead ensure a smaller number of people, only 1 or 2 people, play a central role for child - key worker

  having a key worker means children have the chance to develop normal attachments and help avoid disinhibited attachment
• Weakness - Romanian orphanages weren't typical

  although much useful data about institutionalisation has come out of Romanian orphan studies, it's possible that conditions were so bad results can't be applied to understanding the impact of better quality institutionalisation care or any situation where children and extremely low levels of intellectual stimulation

  Weakness - unusual situational variables means studies may lack generalisability
• Strength - fewer extraneous variables than other orphan studies

  many orphan studies before Romanian orphans became available to study but often studies involved children who had experienced loss or trauma before being institutionalised e.g. experienced neglect, abuse of bereavement

  children were often traumatised by their experiences and suffered bereavement

  very hard to observe the effect of institutionalisation in confounding variables

  Strength - in case of Romanian orphans it's possible to study institutionalisation without confounding variables as most were abandoned at birth increasing the internal validity
• Weakness - individual differences

  may not be true all children who experience institutionalisation are unable to recover.

  research showed that some children aren't as strongly affected as others.

  Rutter has suggested it might be some of children received special attention in institution, perhaps they smiled more, and might have enabled them to cope better

  Weakness - suggests it's not possible to conclude that institutionalisation inevitably leads to a inability to form attachments