maternal deprivation

• Theory of maternal deprivation

  Says emotional and continuous care from a mother or mother substitute is important for mental health and physical health. Being separated from a mother in early childhood has serious effects on child development.
• Bowlby is known for his monotropic theory of attachment. However, he earlier proposed the theory of maternal deprivation.
• Separation


  The child not being in the presence of the primary attachment figure
• Deprivation


  The child becoming deprived of emotional care, which can happen even if a substitute caregiver who can provide emotional care are present
• Critical period


  Bowlby saw the first two-and-a-half years of life as a critical period for psychological development. If a child is separated from their mother for an extended duration during this critical period, Bowlby believed psychological damage was inevitable.
• Effects of maternal deprivation

  • Delayed intellectual development, characterised by abnormally low IQ
  • Affectionless psychopathy - the inability to experience guilt or strong emotion toward others, leading to difficulty forming relationships and association with criminality
• Bowlby's natural experiment


  1. Sample of 44 criminal teenagers accused of stealing were interviewed for signs of affectionless psychopathy and whether they had experienced prolonged early separation from their mothers

  2. Compared to a control group of 30 non-criminal but emotionally disturbed young people

  3. Bowlby concluded that prolonged early separation/deprivation caused affectionless psychopathy
• Bowlby's research on maternal deprivation and its effects on development was not, however, based on participants being assigned to experimental groups. It was a retrospective study.
• Marginal utility


  The additional utility (satisfaction) gained from the consumption of an additional product
• If you add up marginal utility for each unit you get total utility
• Maternal deprivation has been criticised as a legal concept
• Bowlby may have confused deprivation and privation - deprivation refers to the lack of care from an attachment figure, while privation refers to the lack of any attachment in the first place
• Bowlby's idea of a critical period for attachment formation has been challenged, as evidence shows good quality care can prevent most of the damage even in cases of severe deprivation
• Attempts to replicate Bowlby's 44 thieves study have produced conflicting results, with some failing to find an association between early separation and later psychopathy or criminality
• More recent research has partially supported Bowlby by showing poor quality maternal care was linked to higher rates of psychopathy in adults