Disruption of attachment

Disruption of attachment

1. A broken attachment due to a situation such as hospitalisation or parental death

   • Deprivation

2. Bowlby's Maternal Deprivation Hypothesis

   • Breaking the maternal bond in the early years is likely to have serious effects on intellectual, social and emotional development
     • Once the bond is broken it cannot be fixed
   • Consequences of maternal deprivation (ADDIDDAS)
     • Aggression
       • Delinquency
         • Dwarfism
           • Intellectual retardation
             • Depression
               • Dependency
                 • Affectionless
                   • Social Maladjustment

3. Supporting evidence

   • Bowlby's 44 Thieves
     • Compared the background of 44 juvenile thieves with the background of 44 other non-delinquent children
       • 32% were diagnosed as having affectionless psychopathy
       • Most of the 44 had experienced separation for at least one week before the age of five
         • Is this really long enough of a separation to have caused an emotional disturbance?
     • Concluded that separation in early life led to long term ill effects, particularly adversely affecting emotional development.
     • Results are correlational, so we cannot prove cause and effect
       • Other factors, such as temperament or innate personality, could be responsible for the affectionless psychopathy
   • Spitz and Wolf
     • Studied 100 children separated from their mothers during a hospital stay
     • The children became depressed and were only able to make a full recovery if their stay was less than three months long
     • Found there were long term effects to having a deprivation of attachment

4. Later studies have shown that many of the effects of early deprivation can be overcome

   • The effects are not as permanent as Bowlby assumed