4. Animal studies of attachment

Why do psychologists study animals when looking at attachment?

To inform their understanding of human mother-infant interactions

Who studied mechanisms of imprinting?

Lorenz

What animals did Lorenz use?

Greylag geese

2 conditions in Lorenz’s study

Naturally hatched by the mother vs in an incubator with Lorenz as the first moving object they saw.

What did Lorenz do?

Track the behaviour of the goslings in both conditions. He also marked the goslings and placed them under a box, he then removed it and recorded their behaviour.

Lorenz findings

Incubator group followed Lorenz everywhere, whereas control group followed mother, this continued even after two groups were mixed up.

What did Lorenz say the critical period for imprinting was?

4-25hrs

What did goslings that had been imprinted on humans attempt to do later in life?

Mate with a human

Who investigated food vs close comfort on attachment?

Harlow

What animals did Harlow investigate on?

16 baby rhesus monkeys

4 conditions in Harlow’s experiment

• Wire mother producing milk, towelling mother no milk

• Wire mother no milk, towelling mother producing milk

• Wire mother producing milk

• Towelling mother producing milk

What happened in Harlow’s experiment?

Monkeys split into each condition. Amount of time spent with each mother was recorded as well as feeding time. Loud noise was used to test how monkeys behave in times of stress. Large cage used to test exploration.

Harlow’s study findings

Monkeys preferred towelling mother in all conditions, regardless of milk production, some even stretched across to wire mother to drink. Clung to towelling mother in times of stress. Monkeys with wire mother showed stress, diarrhoea. Moneys with towelling mother explored more but returned to mother more frequently.

Harlow’s monkeys in adulthood

Severe consequences- aggressive, less sociable, bred less (unskilled at mating). Neglected their children

evaluation of animal studies- generalisability

p- animal research- can we generalise the findings to humans?

e- may be less appropriate to generalise Lorenz’s research findings as attachment system of birds is less complex and involves less emotion than that of mammals

e- Harlow’s monkeys are more similar to humans- on a biological level all mammals have the same brain structure as humans- only difference relates to size and number of connections, making it easier to generalise

l- however, neither sample are human and so we cannot necessarily be generalised to human attachment

evaluation of animal studies- usefulness of research

p- despite arguements of generalisabilty findings have still been useful to understanding human attachment

e- lorenz’s idea of a critical period influenced Bowlby’s research and led to the idea that human infants need to attach by 2 years old to avoid serious long term consequences

e- similarly, Harlow’s research showed us the consequences of early childhood neglect- and potential long-term consequences of poor attachment in childhood for future relationships- influencing Bowlby’s IWM

l-regardless of being able to generalise animal studies- the findings have been of huge significance to understanding human attachments and how to improve and strengthen it

evaluation of animal studies- ethics vs significance

p- use of animals in research can be questioned on ethical grounds

e- can be argued that animal have a right not to be researched on/harmed- the pursuit of academic conclusions for human benefits could be seen as detrimental to non-human species

e- however, it would not be possible to carry out this research on human infants and the findings have huge significance- e.g. helping social workers to identify risk factors in vulnerable children and preventing long term negative consequences.

l- have to think about a cost-benefit analysis of the harm caused to the rhesus moneys versus the benefit to human infants and our understanding of human attachments.