Explanations of attachment

Explanations of attachment

1. Learning Theory

   • According to behaviourists, behaviour is not innate but learned. Learning can be due to associations being made between different stimuli (classical conditioning) or behaviour can be altered by patterns of reinforcement (reward) and punishment (operant conditioning)
   • Neo-behaviourists suggest that we learn by watching others (social learning theory or SLT). Social learning of this sort is particularly powerful when we see others being reinforced or punished for their actions.

2. Behaviourist explanations of attachment

   • Dollard and Miller (1950)
     • Operant Conditioning
       • Suggested that the attachment was due to drive reduction. Hunger and cold have a strong motivating affect on the child, driving the child to satisfy its need by eating or seeking warmth. Obtaining food or warmth results in drive reduction which in itself provides reward for the child
         • Hunger and cold (discomfort) are referred to as primary drives and food and warmth are primary reinforcers. The person supplying the food and warmth (usually the mother) becomes associated with the food and warmth and acts as a secondary reinforcer. The attachment occurs because the child wants the person providing the food and warmth.
     • Classical Conditioning
       • The child simply associates food and mother together, much as Pavlov’s dogs associated bell and food together
       • 1) Food is an unconditioned stimulus that produces an unconditioned response (pleasure)
         • 2) At the outset, mother is a neutral stimulus who produces no response (pleasure)
           • 3) However, because she is continually paired with the unconditioned stimulus (food) she slowly becomes associated with it until eventually mother alone can produce pleasure.
             • 4) Mother has now become a conditioned stimulus and the pleasure she brings is a conditioned response
     • Evaluation
       • As always the behaviourist explanation is reductionist because it takes a complex human behaviour and tries to explain it in the simplest terms possible
       • The behaviourist theories of attachments (and Freud’s psychodynamic) are sometimes referred to as cupboard love theories because of their emphasis on food and feeding.

3. Harlow’s monkeys (1959): ‘The origins of love.’

   • Harry Harlow used rhesus monkeys in his research into learning and noticed that many of the young monkeys kept in isolation became distressed when he cleaned out their cages. It seemed that the monkeys were forming an attachment with the sanitary towels he used to line the base of the cages.
   • Procedure
     • Harlow carried out a number of variations using sixteen young isolated monkeys. Some where kept in cages with both a wire surrogate mother and a softer one covered in Terry cloth whilst others were kept in cages with just one
       • Sometimes the monkeys would be fed by the wire mother and other times by the softer cuddlier mother. However, the important variation was the one with a monkey in a cage with a wire mother that provided food and a Terry cloth mother that didn’t (providing the monkey with a choice; food or comfort)
   • Findings
     • Harlow noticed that the monkeys would spend most time clinging to the cloth mother and occasionally feeding from the wire mother
     • When the monkeys were stressed by a mechanical toy banging a drum the monkeys would always run to the cloth mum for safety suggesting an attachment. Also the monkeys with only wire mothers produced water faeces which was attributed to stress
   • Conclusion
     • The evidence suggested that warmth and comfort rather than food were more important in nurturing an attachment and provided scientific evidence against the behaviourist (and psychodynamic) cupboard love theories.
   • Evaluation
     • Clearly because Harlow used monkeys it is difficult to generalise the findings and conclusions to humans. However, the Glasgow babies study also suggested that babies didn’t always form attachments with the food provider.
     • There are also serious ethical issues with this study. The young of an intelligent species are reared in isolation and not allowed to form attachments with their own species

4. Social Learning Theory (SLT)

   • This is similar in some respects to learning theory, in that both emphasise the role of reinforcement. However, SLT emphasises the role of imitation. We watch others and if they are rewarded for their behaviour we are likely to copy it ourselves.
   • Hay and Vespo (1988)
     • Suggested that attachments develop because parents teach their children to love them.
       • This can be achieved in three ways:
         • 1) Modelling
           • Children copy the affectionate behaviour that they see between their parents.
         • 2) Direct Instruction
           • Parents teach their children to be affectionate.
         • 3) Social Facilitation
           • Parents watch their children and encourage appropriate behaviours
   • Evaluatiom
     • Durkin (1995)
       • Does not believe that SLT can explain the intensity of emotion that the attachment produces.
     • The theory can be said to be influential in that it has stimulated a lot of research into the interactions that take place between parents and their children