LORENZ

• IMPRINTING

  • An innate readiness to develop a strong bond with the mother which takes place during a specific time in development
  • A phenomenon in which certain animals attach themselves to and follow the 1st moving object they see
• LORENZ

  Noticed how a duckling transferred its affection to him - an observation that would later lead to his work on imprinting for which he received a Nobel prize
• LORENZ IMPRINTING STUDY 1935 AIM

  To investigate the mechanisms of imprinting where the youngsters follow and form an attachment to the first large moving object that they meet
• LORENZ STUDY PROCEDURE

  1. Lorenz split a large clutch of greylag goose eggs into two batches, one of which was hatched naturally by the mother and the other hatched in an incubator, with Lorenz making sure he was the first moving object the newly hatched goslings encountered. Following behaviour was then recorded
  2. Lorenz then marked all of the goslings, so he could determine whether they were from the naturally hatched batch of eggs or the incubated ones, and placed them under an upturned box. The box was then removed and following behaviour again recorded
• LORENZ FINDINGS

  1. Naturally hatched baby goslings followed their mother about, while the incubator hatched goslings followed Lorenz around
  2. When released from upturned box - Naturally hatched goslings went straight to their mother, while the incubated goslings went to Lorenz, showing no bond with their natural mother. These bonds proved to be irreversible; the naturally hatched goslings would only follow their mother and the incubated ones would only follow Lorenz
• LORENZ FINDINGS

  3. Lorenz noted how imprinting would only occur within a brief, set time period of between 4 and 25 hours after hatching (critical period)

  4. Lorenz subsequently reported on how goslings imprinted onto humans would, as matured adult birds, attempt to mate with humans
• LORENZ CONCLUSION

  Imprinting is a form of attachment, exhibited mainly by nidifugous birds (ones that leave the nest early) whereby close contact is kept with the first large moving object encountered
• LORENZ STRENGTH

  Long lasting effects - Lorenz (1952) found the process of imprinting is irreversible and long lasting. One of his geese (Martina) used to sleep on his bed every night. Lorenz also noted early imprinting had an effect on later mate preferences (sexual imprinting) where animals choose to mate with the same kind of object upon which they were imprinted
• LORENZ STRENGTH - FURHTER RESEARCH SUPPORT

  Guiton (1966) found when chicks were exposed to simple shape combinations (a triangle with a rectangle in front) they followed the original most closely. This shows that young animals are born with an innate mechanism to imprint on a moving object present in the critical window of development
• LORENZ WEAKNESS

  Criticisms of imprinting - Imprinting is a more “plastic and forgiving mechanism” - Guiton (1956) found that he could reverse the imprinting of the chickens that tried to mate with the gloves. After spending time with their own species, they were able to engage in normal sexual behaviour
• LORENZ WEAKNESS

  Can the results be generalised to humans?

  Mammalian attachment system is quite different from that in birds, as mammalian mothers show more emotional attachment to young than do birds. This suggests that mammals may be able to form attachments at any time and therefore it may not be appropriate to generalise any of Lorenz’s ideas to humans - Problems of extrapolation to attachment in human infants - What happens to non human species may not apply to human infants
• WHAT IS THE CRITICAL PERIOD FOR IMPRINTING IN GEESE?

  12-17 HOURS
• CRITICAL PERIOD

  A time limit by which imprinting or attachment must take place