Bowlby's Theory of Maternal Deprivation

• What does Bowlby's Maternal Deprivation theory argue?

  If the child's monotropic attachment is disrupted during the critical period;

  • Prolonged period of separation from the mother.

  It will result in negative and irreversible consequences which affects the infants social, emotional and intellectual skills.
• What is deprivation?

  When an infant had an attachment but this attachment is disrupted for a prolonged period of time.
• What is the critical period in an infant?

  30 months (2.5 years)

  • There is a risk up to 5 years
• What are the consequences of Deprivation?

  • Delinquency
  • Affectionless Psychopathy
• How does Deprivation cause Delinquency?

  Due to the disrupted social development, behaviour is often outside acceptable norms such as petty crime.
• How does Deprivation lead to Affectionless Psychopathy?

  Due to disrupted emotional development, children are unable to show caring behaviour to others or empathy for other people's feelings.

  • They have little guilt for their harmful actions
• What is another thing that can be a result of deprivation?

  LOW IQ
• How does Deprivation lead to Low IQ?

  The disruption in the intellectual development can lead to cognitive abilities being lower than peers.
• What does the monotropic relationship with mothers do?

  Forms a schema of how future relationships should work

  • Internal Working Model
• What is the Continuity Hypothesis?

  It suggests deprivation caused by prolonged separations from the mother limits the ability of the infant to form an effective internal working model.

  • Leads to unsuccessful childhood and adult relationships and issues with their parenting skills.
• EVALUATION - RESEARCH SUPPORT

  BOWLBY 1944 - 44 THIEVES STUDY

  He had 44 child thieves and a control group of 44 emotional disrupted non-thieves interviewed to assess affectionless psychopathy.

  
  

  The parents were asked about maternal deprivation during the critical period.

  
  

  • He found that 14 thieves matched the criteria for affectionless psychopathy compared to none of the control group.
  • 12 of the thieves had experienced prolonged separation compared to only two of the control group.

  This suggests a link between maternal deprivation and delinquency.
• EVALUATION - WEAKNESS

  The research for 44 thieves study is correlational, deprivation and delinquency could be linked to a third factor.

  
  

  Children who experience deprivation may also experience extreme poverty, have contact with criminal relatives who act as role models or have family history of mental health problems.
• EVALUATION - STRENGTH

  REAL LIFE APPLICATION

  Bowlby's work has led to significant positive changes to policies that are related to child welfare such as visiting times for mother's in hospitals.

  The ratio of carers and infants at nursery school and length of maternity leave.

  While it has improved child welfare, it has also impacted economy as nursery places are now more expensive.

  Social sensitivity should also be considered as the focus on maternity could have resulted in an increase in the gender pay gap because women are missing opportunities for development and promotion
• EVALUATION - WEAKNESS

  GENDER BIAS

  His emphasis on mothers underestimate the roles of fathers and other attachment figures.

  Schaffer's work shows that children quickly move from one specific attachment.

  • 87% infants had multiple attachments at 18 months.
• EVALUATION - WEAKNESS

  Argument for Critical Period

  Bowlby argued that there was irreversible damage due to deprivation but findings from the orphan study suggests that children have a sensitive period not critical.

  Rutter, Hodges and Tizard all showed that while deprivation can have damaging long-term effects, with suitable care many of the effects can be reversed.