Animal Studies

Animal Studies

1. Lorenz (1952) Imprinting

   • Randomly divided 12 goose eggs
     • Half hatched with the mother
       • In a natural environment
     • Half hatched in an incubator
       • Where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz
         • Lorenz then mixed all the birds together to see who they would follow
           • He also observed the birds later courtship behaviour
             • Sexual imprinting occurs whereby the birds acquire a template
               • Of the desirable characteristics required in a mate
           • He found that the incubator group followed Lorenz
             • And the control group followed the mother goose
               • From this Lorenz identified a critical period in which imprinting needs to take place
                 • Few hours after hatching
                 • If imprinting did not occur within that time...
                   • Chicks did not attach themselves to the mother figure

2. Harlow (1958) Importance of contact comfort

   • Harlow reared 16 rhesus monkeys with two wire mothers
     • In one condition
       • Milk was dispensed by the plain wire mother
     • In the other condition
       • It was dispensed by the cloth covered mothers
         • The monkeys preferences were measured
           • In addition to this the monkeys behaviour was observed when placed in more frightening situations
             • For example Harlow placed a noise making teddy bear with the monkeys
             • It was found the monkeys sought comfort from the cloth mother when frightened
           • It was found that the baby monkeys cuddled the soft mothers
             • Regardless of which one dispensed milk
               • This suggests that contact comfort was more important than food
                 • When it came to attachment behaviour
                   • The monkeys were also observed into adulthood
                     • And it was found that by being deprived of their real mothers
                       • Had caused severe consequences
                         • They were more aggressive
                           • Less sociable
                             • And less skilled in mating with other monkeys
                               • They also neglected
                                 • And sometimes killed
                                   • Their own offspring

3. Strengths

   • Support for the Concept of Imprinting
     • Guiton (1966)
       • Found that chicks imprinted on yellow rubber gloves
         • And tried to mate with them as adults
         • This suggests that animals are born with an innate tendency
           • To imprint on the first moving object they see
             • During the critical window of development
   • Harlows research has practical applications
     • It has helped social workers understand risk factors in child abuse
       • And so intervene to prevent it
         • (Howe 1998)
       • We now understand the importance of attachment figures
         • For baby monkeys in zoos and breeding programmes in the wild
           • The usefulness of Harlow's research
             • Increases its value

4. Limitations

   • Issues with generalisation
     • In the case of Lorenz
       • The attachment system is very different for birds
         • When compared to human attachments
           • So it is not appropriate to generalise these findings
     • In the case of Harlow
       • Although monkeys are more similar than geese
         • They are still not humans
           • For example human babies form speech like communcaition
             • Babbling
             • Which may help with forming attachments
           • Scientists disagree on the extent
             • To which humans can be compared to monkeys
   • Ethics
     • Harlow received severe criticism for the ethics in his study
       • Rhesus monkeys are similar enough to humans to generalise finding
         • Which also means their suffering was presumably human-like
           • The counter argument was that the importance of Harlow's research
             • Justified the procedures he used