Harlow

Harlow

1. Aim:

   • Harlow wanted to study the mechanisms by which the newborn Rhesus monkeys bond with their mothers.

2. Methods:

   • 1: Infant monkeys reared in isolation.
   • 2: He took the monkeys away from their mothers soon after birth and raised them in cages with 2 surrogate mothers. One of which dispensed food but was hard and made from wire. The other was also made from wire and was covered with warm, soft terry cloth yet didn't dispense food.

3. Results:

   • 1: Some of the monkeys died, others were frightened and behaved in an abnormal manner. They could not interact with other monkeys even when they were older.
   • 2: The monkeys only displayed attachment behaviours towards the soft warm mother. They ony went to the wire mother when hungry and, even then, they went straight back to the warm mother. This refutes cupboard love.

4. A02:

   • There are ethical implications of this study as it was the study which helped animal rights in psychology become important. Now psychologists can only carry out experiments on animals if the pros outway the cons. Also the results and conclusions from the study must be of huge importance or they must be revolutionary.
   • Schafer and Emerson (1964) confirmed that food was not the primary explanation for attachment. They observed 60 babies from mainly working class families in Glasgow over a period of about 1 year. They found that he children showed the most attachment to not those who fed them but those adults who were most sensitively responsive to them and interacted with them the most.
     • Longtudinal Study- Attrition Rate
     • Small Sample Size
     • Low population validity
   • Learning theory suggests that if the repeated pairings of carer are not kept up then the association will extinguish. Observations of children who have been seperated from their parents for a length of time show that their attachment has not been extinguished.
   • Learning theory also suggests that punishment should lead to the lessoning of attachment. In both Harlow's research and in other studies of children however, it has been found that once an attachment is formed, they will continue to return to that attchment figure again and again even when they are physically abused.