Maternal deprivation

Maternal deprivation

1. Bowlby 1951

   • This theory focused on the idea that the continual presence of nurture from a mother or mother-substitute is essential for normal psychological development of babies and toddlers, both emotionally and intellectually.

2. Separation simply means the child is not in the presence of the primary attachment figure

   • This only becomes an issue for development if the child is deprived i.e. they lose an element of care
   • Brief separations, particularly where the child is with a substitute caregiver, are not significant enough for development but extended separations can lead to deprivation, which by definition causes harm

3. Bowlby saw the first 30 months of life as a critical period for psychological development

   • If a child is separated from their mother in the absence of sutiable suitable substitute care and so deprived of her emotional care for an extended period during this critical period, then Bowlby believed psychological damage was inevitable

4. Intellectual development - Bowlby believed that if children were deprived of maternal care for too long during the critical period they would suffer mental retardation, characterised by abnormally low IQ

   • Goldfarb (1947) - found lower IQ in children who had remained in institutions as opposed to those who were fostered and had a higher standard of emotional care

5. Emotional development - Bowlby identified affectionless psychopathy as the inability to experience guilty or strong emotion for others, preventing the person developing normal relationships and is associated with criminality

   • They cannot appreciate the feelings of victims and so lack remorse for their actions
   • 44 thieves study - 44 criminal teenagers interviewed for signs of affectionless psychopathy and their families were interviewed to establish whether prolonged early separations from their mothers had occured.
     • 14/44 thieves could be described as affectionless psychopaths - 12/14 had experienced prolonged separation from their mothers in the first 2 years of their lives
       • 5/30 of the remaining thieves had experienced separations
       • 2/44 control group had experienced long separations
     • It was concluded that prolonged early separation-deprivation caused affectionless psychopathy