Bowlby’s Theory of Maternal Deprivation

What is monotropy?

Monotropy is the term Bowlby gives for the unique attachment bond between an infant and its mother. The mother acts as a secure base, which the child uses to explore the world and return to for comfort and safety

What is Bowlby’s theory of maternal deprivation?

Bowlby argues if the child’s monotropic attachment is disrupted during the critical period, such as through prolonged separation from the mother, this deprivation will result in negative and irreversible consequences, affecting the infant’s social, emotional and intellectual skills

When is the critical period?

The infants first 30 months (2 and a half years). However, there is a risk of up to 5 years

What are the 3 consequences of deprivation?

• Delinquency

• Affectionless psychopathy

• Low IQ

Consequences of deprivation → Delinquency

Due to disrupted social development, behaviour is often outside acceptable norms, such as petty crime

Consequences of delinquency → Affectionless psychopathy

Due to disrupted emotional development, children are unable to show caring behaviour to others or empathy for other people’s feelings and have little guilt for their harmful actions

Consequences of delinquency → Low IQ

Due to disrupted intellectual development, cognitive abilities are lower than peers

The monotropic relationship and its future impact:

As the monotropic relationship with the mother is the first and most important relationship the infant has, it forms a template (schema) for future relationships called an internal working model

What is the continuity hypothesis?

Suggests deprivation caused by prolonged separations from the mother limits the ability of the infant to form an effective internal working model, leading to unsuccessful childhood and adult relationships and issues with their parenting skills

AO3 - Bowlby (1944)

Supported his theory with the 44 thieve study, 44 child thieves and a control group of 44 emotionally disturbed non thieves were interviewed to assess affectionless psychopathy and parents were asked about maternal deprivation during the critical period. It was found 14 thieves had experienced prolonged separation compared to only 2 of the control group. This suggests a link between maternal deprivation and delinquency

AO3 - Research supporting maternal deprivation is only correlational

(Including the 44 thieves study) Deprivation and delinquency could be linked to a third factor. Children who experience deprivation may also experience extreme poverty, have contact with criminal relatives who act as role models or have a family history of mental health problems

AO3 - Real world application

Bowlby’s work on attachment led to significant positive changes to policies related to child welfare, such as visiting time for mothers in hospitals, the ratio of carers and infants at nursery school and the length of maternity leave. While this has improved child welfare it has also impacted the economy as nursery places are now more expensive. Social sensitivity should also be considered as the focus on maternity rather than paternity leave may have resulted in an increase in the gender pay gap, with women missing opportunities for development and promotion

AO3 - Monotropy may exaggerate the importance of the mother as a primary caregiver…

This focus on the mother may be gender biased (alpha bias), underestimating the role of the father and other attachment figures. Shaffer’s work shows children quickly move on from one specific attachment, with 87% of infants having multiple attachments at 18 months. Other research indicates important roles for the father in early attachment, such as encouraging risk taking, developing socialisation and even taking on the sensitive responsive role when acting as the primary caregiver

AO3 - Sensitive, not critical period

Bowlby argues for a critical period and irreversible damage due to deprivation, however the findings of orphan studies suggests children have a sensitive, not critical period. Rutter, Hodges and Tizard or Goldfarb, all showed that while deprivation can have damaging and long term effects, with suitable care many of these effects can be reversed