Romanian orphans

• Rutter et al's research - procedure

  followed a group of 165 Romanian orphans for years as a part of the English + Romanian adoptee study.

  orphans adopted by families in the UK.

  Physical, cognitive and emotional development assessed at ages 4, 6, 11, 15 and 22-25 years to investigate if good care could make up for institutionalisation.

  control group of 52 adopted UK children.
• Rutter et al's research - findings

  Mean IQ of those adopted before 6 months was 102, between 6 months and 2 years was 86, after 2 years was 77.

  children adopted after 6 months showed signs of disinhibited attachment.
• Zeanah et al.'s research - procedure

  Conducted the Bucharest early intervention project

  assessed attachment in 95 Romanian children aged 12-31 months who spent most of their lives in institutional care.

  compared to control group of 50 children who never lived in an institution.

  attachment type assessed using the Strange Situation.

  Carers asked about unusual social behaviour.
• Zeanah et al's research - findings

  74% of the control group were securely attached

  19% of the institutional group were securely attached.

  44% of institutional group had disinhibited attachment compared to less than 20% of the controls.
• disinhibited attachment

  being equally friendly and affectionate towards familiar people and strangers.

  symptoms include - attention-seeking, clinginess and indiscriminate social behaviour
• strength - real-world application

  Studies applied to improve conditions for children growing up outside their family home.

  Children's homes have one or two key workers who play a central role in a child's emotional care.

  institutional care also now seen as an undesirable option.

  effort made to accomodate well-cared children to foster care or adoption.
• strength - fewer confounding variables

  Children from Romanian orphanages all had the same experiences and they had been handed over by loving parents therefore, were much less likely to be confounded by negative early experiences.
• counterpoint - confounding variables

  the care in the Romanian orphanages was very poor therefore, harmful effects could be due to poor institutional care.
• limitation - lack of adult data

  latest data from Rutter's study looked at children from early to mid 20s.

  means there isn't data to look at long-term effects. for example, mental health problems and ability to form adult romantic or parental relationshops.

  take some time before more is known about long-term effects.