Psychology essay 12
Outline Lorenz’s and Harlow’s animal studies of attachment. Discuss what these studies might tell us about human attachment
KEY STUDY: LORENZ (1935)
STUDY TIP: You may be asked specifically about Lorenz or Harlow’s research or about animal research in general. Make sure you are clear about what you will say in each response.
Aim: Lorenz wanted to investigate imprinting in attachment formation. (Phenomenon where birds such as geese and chickens, which are mobile from birth, follow the first moving object, usually the mother.)
Procedure:
1. 2. 3. 4. Lorenz randomly split a batch of grey goose eggs into two groups.
One group were hatched by their mother in a natural environment (control group).
The other group were hatched in an incubator where the first moving object they saw was
Lorenz (experimental group).
The behaviour of the geese was then carefully observed.
Lorenz also observed the effect of imprinting on adult mate preferences.
Findings:
1. The experimental group imprinted on Lorenz; demonstrated by the fact that they followed him wherever he went.
The control group hatched imprinted on their mother.
When the two groups were mixed up, the control group continued to follow the mother and the experimental group followed Lorenz.
Lorenz noted imprinting would only occur within a critical period (between 4 and 25 hours).
5. Lorenz reported that geese who imprinted on a human would later display courtship behaviour towards humans.
2. 3. 4. 9Evaluation (A03) Lorenz
✘ Critical Period has been questioned
P- A weakness of Lorenz’s study is that research conducted by Sluckin (1966) questions the validity of the critical period. E- Sluckin replicated Lorenz’s research using ducklings instead of goslings. Like Lorenz, he got the ducklings to imprint on him. E- However, Sluckin kept one duckling in isolation well beyond Lorenz’s reported critical period. He found it was still possible to imprint this youngster. L- This suggests critical period was actually a sensitive period, but attachments could still be formed.
✘ Imprinting can be reversed
P- A weakness of Lorenz is that research has shown that imprinting can be reversed. E-Guiton (1996) found that chickens who imprinted on yellow washing up gloves would try to mate with them as adults (as Lorenz would have predicted), but that with experience they eventually learned to prefer mating with other chickens. L- This suggests that the impact of imprinting on mating behaviour is not as permanent as Lorenz believed.
× Generalisability to humans
P-One limitation of Lorenz’s studies is the ability to generalise findings and conclusions from birds to humans. E-The mammalian attachment system is quite different and more complex than that in birds. For example, in mammals attachment is a two-way process, so it is not just the young who become attached to their mothers but also the mammalian mothers show an emotional attachment to their young. L-This means that it is probably not appropriate to generalise Lorenz’s ideas to humans.
10Knowledge (A03) Animal studies of attachment: Lorenz
KEY STUDY: HARLOW (1959)
Aim: Harlow wanted to find whether contact comfort was more important in attachment than food (cupboard love theory)
Procedure:
1. Harlow reared 16 baby rhesus monkeys with two surrogate (or substitute) mothers. One of the “mothers” was made of wire and the other was covered in soft material. The wire mother produced milk whereas the cloth-covered mother did not.
2. 3. The amount of time spent with each mother, as well as feeding time, was recorded.
The monkeys were deliberately frightened with a loud noise to test for mother preference during stress.
4. The long-term effects were recorded: E.g., the monkey’s behaviour in adulthood in terms of sociability and their relationship to their own offspring.
Findings:
1. 2. 3. The monkeys spent most of their time on their cloth mother even though she did not supply milk. The cloth mother provided “contact comfort” which was clearly preferable. The monkeys even stretched across to the wire mother to feed while still clinging to the cloth mother. When frightened, by a loud noise, the monkeys clung to the cloth mother.
As adults, the monkeys were abusive to their offspring, even killing them in some cases. The monkeys were also more aggressive and less sociable than other monkeys
Conclusion: This study shows that “contact comfort” is of more importance to monkey than food when it comes to attachment.
11Evaluation (A03) Harlow
Highly valued Research
P-A strength of Harlow’s study is that Harlow’s findings had a profound effect on psychologists’ understanding of mother-infant attachment; E-Harlow showed that attachment does not develop as the result of being fed by a mother figure (as the learning theory would suggest) but as a result of contact comfort. E-Harlow also showed the importance of the quality of early relationships for later social development. L-Therefore, this research has led to important developments in the area of attachment.
P-Another strength is that the insight into attachment from Harlow’s research has had important practical applications in a range of contexts. E-For example, it has helped social workers understand risks factors in child neglect and abuse and so intervene to prevent it. L-Therefore being able to apply our knowledge of animal research to real life situations.
× Ethical Issues
P-However, an issue with the research is Harlow faced severe criticism for the ethics of this research. The monkeys suffered greatly as a result of Harlow’s procedures E-e.g. they were deliberately stressed and frightened. E-Rhesus monkeys are closely related to humans suggesting that these animals suffered more greatly than less developed animals such as geese. L-The unethical practices seriously undermine the credibility of psychology as a science. CA- However, a counter-argument is that Harlow’s research is sufficiently important to justify these negative effects. E.g., they have highlighted the importance of contact comfort in child development.
NB: Be Careful if talking about ethics – animal studies do not adhere to the same ethical guidelines as human studies, e.g. they can’t sign a consent form!
× Generalisability to humans
P-One limitation of Harlow’s research is the ability to generalise findings and conclusions from monkeys to humans. E- Rhesus monkeys are much more similar to humans than Lorenz’s birds, and all mammals share more common attachment behaviour. E-However, the human brain and human behaviour is still more complex than that of monkeys. L-This means that it may not be appropriate to generalise Harlow’s findings to humans.
There are two main animal studies in attachment- Lorenz and Harlow. Lorenz studied imprinting in attachment formation, which is a phenomenon where birds follow the first moving object that they see, which is usually the mother. He randomly split a batch of grey goose eggs into two groups, where one group was hatched by their mother as a control group and the other were hatched in an incubator where the first moving object they saw was Lorenz. The behaviour of the groups were monitored, as well as the effects of imprinting on adult mate preferences. They found that the experimental group imprinted on Lorenz, and later demonstrated courtship behaviour towards humans.
Harlow studied whether contact comfort was more important than food in attachment. He reared 16 baby rhesus monkeys with twos surrogate mothers- one made of wire that could feed the monkeys and one made of cloth that could not. The monkeys spent most of their time on the cloth mother even though it did not provide milk. When frightened, they clung to the cloth mother. As adults, they were more abusive, even killing their offspring.
One weakness of Lorenz’ study is that research has shown that imprinting can be reversed. Hutton found that chickens who imprinted on yellow washing up gloves would try to mate with them as adults (as Lorenz predicted) but with experience they eventually learned to prefer mating with other chickens. This suggests that the impact of imprinting on mating behaviour is not as permanent as Lorenz believed.
One strength of Harlow’s research is that the findings had a profound effect on psychologist’s understanding of mother-infant attachment. Harlow showed that attachment does not develop as the result of being fed by a mother figure but as a result of contact comfort. He also showed the importance of the quality of early relationships for later social development. Therefore, this research has led to important developments in the area of attachment. In addition to this, he has had important practical applications such as helping social workers understand the risk factors in child neglect and abuse and so intervene to prevent it. Therefore we are able to apply the knowledge of animal reszearch to real life situations.
One limitation of both Harlow and lorenz’s research is that it has a very low generalisability to humans. Rhesus monkeys are much more similar to humans than lorenz’s birds, and all mammals share more common attachment behaviours. However, the human brain and human behaviour is still more complex than that of monkeys. This means that it may not be appropriate to generalise Harlow and lorenz’s findings to humans.
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