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Attachment is an emotional bond or tie felt towards another person which provides feelings of security and closeness. In caregiver and child relationships, attachment is a two-way emotional bond that is strengthened through reciprocal interactions.
A disruption to attachment is a scenario where an attachment between a child and a caregiver is broken, either temporarily or permanently.
A disruption to attachment can damage a child’s emotional and behavioral development. However, the effects on the child can vary depending on the nature of the disruption to attachment. Generally, the more severe the disruption, the more damage it can cause to the child.
We will be looking at deprivation, privation, and separation as disruptions to attachment. It is important to define all these terms and to understand the difference between them.
Continuous care from a primary caregiver is essential to avoid damage from a disruption to attachment. Unsplash.com
Deprivation is where a child’s attachment to its mother or other caregiver has been significantly broken, due to a period of no care being given to the child. It is a period long enough for the bond between the child and caregiver to be seriously damaged.
In severe cases of deprivation, the bond may be destroyed altogether. This can cause permanent or long-term social and emotional damage to the child.
A child’s mother (the primary caregiver) falls ill and has to be hospitalized for a minimum of six months. This may cause the child to suffer from deprivation due to the loss of care during this time. The attachment between the child and its mother may be seriously damaged or even broken, depending on the length of time the child is deprived of care.
Privation is where a child has never formed a bond or attachment with their mother or any caregiver. Usually, this is because the child has never had a chance to do so.
Having lost their parents in war, a child is raised by social services or institutions. The child is likely to suffer from privation as they never had the chance to form a bond with a caregiver.
Separation is where the caregiver is temporarily absent from the child for a short period of time. Unless separation occurs regularly, it is unlikely that the child will suffer from social and emotional damage.
A child is left with their grandparents for a week whilst their parents attend a wedding in another city. The child is unlikely to suffer from permanent or long-term damage unless they are frequently separated from their parents.
Make sure you understand the difference between separation and deprivation. Although they may sound similar, the scenarios are very different and therefore the effects on the child are also very different. You can revisit the definitions above to strengthen your understanding.
Now that you know how deprivation, privation, and separation can disrupt attachment, we will be looking at the effects that each of these types of disruption can have on a child.
The main psychological research we will be considering is John Bowlby’s theory of maternal deprivation and his study of the 44 thieves.
In 1953, Bowlby discussed the effects of maternal deprivation on the long-term development of the child. His maternal deprivation hypothesis states that if the attachment bond between mother and child is significantly disrupted (maternal deprivation), the child may suffer from:
Lower intelligence levels.
Increased aggression.
Delinquency.
According to Bowlby, delinquency is one of the potential results of maternal deprivation. Unsplash.com
Bowlby believed the effects of maternal deprivation on social, emotional and intellectual development were permanent and irreversible. He also stated that children who suffered detrimental effects from maternal deprivation are more likely to commit offences and develop affectionless psychopathy.
Affectionless psychopathy is the inability on the part of an individual to experience guilt for their actions or empathy for others.
This can cause a higher likelihood of committing crimes and can hinder the formation of healthy relationships with others.
Bowlby suggested continuous care from a mother or another primary caregiver was essential to avoid any damage caused by disruption to attachment.
In this study, Bowlby aimed to test the maternal deprivation hypothesis by investigating the link between maternal deprivation and criminal behaviour.
Procedure for the main group:
44 teenagers accused of stealing were interviewed along with the teenagers’ families.
Through the interviews, Bowlby established whether the teenagers had been separated from their mothers during their childhoods.
Bowlby also tested the teenagers for affectionless psychopathy.
A control group was set up with 44 non-criminal but emotionally damaged teenagers. They were interviewed using the same procedure as in the main group. The two groups were compared to see if there was any correlation between maternal deprivation and emotional development.
Bowlby’s findings:
Of the 44 teenagers in the main group (accused of stealing), 14 could be described as affectionless psychopaths.
Of the 14 affectionless psychopaths, 12 had experienced maternal deprivation in the first two years of their lives.
Of the 44 in the control group (not accused of stealing), none were affectionless psychopaths. Only two of the 44 in the control group were maternally deprived.
A visual representation of the findings in Bowlby’s study of 44 thieves. StudySmarter Originals
Bowlby concluded that early maternal deprivation caused affectionless psychopathy, which in turn led to crime. The conclusion supports the maternal deprivation hypothesis as it shows that deprivation can cause long-term and serious damage to social and emotional development.
The findings of the 44 thieves study may have been influenced by experimenter bias as it was Bowlby himself interviewing the teenagers. He may have had an interest in proving his maternal deprivation hypothesis correct, possibly affecting the validity of his findings.
The conclusions of the study are more correlational than causational. Although a link was found between maternal deprivation and affectionless psychopathy, it does not mean the former causes the latter. Rutter (1972) stated that other factors such as family issues may have had an impact.
The participants of the study were taken from a London clinic in the 1940s. The findings cannot be generalized; they have low population validity. Having a low population validity means a finding cannot be applied to the general population as a whole.
The maternal deprivation theory has considerable research support, including Goldfarb (1947), Silver (1967), Spitz (1945), and Hodges and Tizard (1989).
The main psychological research we will be considering is the case study of Genie as reported by Curtiss (1977), and the case study of the Czech twins as reported by Koluchova (1976).
Genie (an alias) was found at the age of 13 in Los Angeles, USA, in 1970, by welfare officers who discovered that she had been abused her whole life. She had been kept tied to a potty chair in a small, silent room and her movement was restricted by a straitjacket since she was a toddler. She was physically punished by her father for making any noises such as speaking or crying.
As a result, she was unable to speak. Her physical condition resembled that of a 6 or 7-year-old as she was underweight. She could not fully extend her limbs or focus her eyes and she had nearly double the number of teeth. She could not control her bowel movements as she was never potty trained and continued wearing ‘nappies’ at 13. She was stated to be a feral (wild) child.
Doctors, linguists and psychologists were interested in whether she could learn how to communicate and learn language skills. After she was found, she showed signs of progress as she learned to play, dress herself and draw sketches of what she wanted. She could form relationships with those around her, such as her doctors.
She learned to speak a few words. However, she could not form full sentences or grasp grammar. Curtiss, who documented Genie’s progress, said that she was past the crucial age of learning how to form sentences, which is between the ages of five and ten.
Genie is now 64 and remains in state care, the location of which is kept private by Californian authorities. The details of her condition and progress are unknown, including whether she can communicate fully and interact normally with people.
Genie’s is an extreme case of privation and suggests that children facing severe conditions of abuse, neglect or social isolation may have permanent and serious developmental damage. In cases such as Genie’s, it is likely that the effects of privation are irreversible.
In 1960 in (the former) Czechoslovakia, two identical twin boys were born in a children’s home. Their biological mother died in childbirth. They spent almost a year there before being handed to the care of their father and stepmother. The stepmother treated the twins cruelly and kept them in a small, cellar-like space. They did not form attachments with any caregivers.
When discovered at the age of seven, it was found they had poor speech and difficulty walking due to nutrient deficiencies. Jarmila Koluchova reported the twins’ conditions and progress. They were adopted and cared for well by two sisters. At the age of 14, they were tested for development and psychologists found no long-term or detrimental effects of privation. They grew into healthy adults, found employment and had formed relationships with others.
The study of the Czech twins suggests it is possible to reverse the effects of privation and to achieve long-term developmental recovery.
The differences in recovery from privation between Genie and the Czech twins
It is believed that several factors were responsible. These are outlined below.
| Factor | Genie | Czech twins |
| Age at discovery | Discovered at 13 | Discovered at 7 |
| Living conditions | Grew up alone | Grew up together |
| Brain conditions | Father claimed she was born with brain damage | No brain damage discovered |
| Quality of care after discovery | Unstable and poor quality of care due to abusive foster parents and inconsistency in caregivers | Good quality of care after adoption in a stable home environment |
The main research into the effects of privation is through case studies. Whilst they provide in-depth information, case studies are not generalisable as the conditions of the case study are unique. It is difficult to make generalizations or theories based on case studies.
There are major ethical concerns in studying the effects of privation, as psychologists need to balance between safeguarding the victim and carrying out adequate research. In Genie’s case, there were several claims of psychologists and doctors’ exploiting’ her unique situation to advance their careers.
However, as mentioned above, case studies provide significant detail into the effects of privation as the subject’s progress is often monitored over years.
Although each victim of privation experiences unique conditions, some comparisons (as made above) can be made to explain the differences in recovery from privation.
The main psychological research we will be considering is the protest-despair-detachment (PDD) model by John Robertson and John Bowlby (1952) . This model considers the effects of short-term separation.
Robertson and Bowlby suggested that the effects of short-term separation may be the same as the effects of deprivation despite the difference in the scenarios. They found that short-term separation can result in long-lasting emotional damage. They suggested that children follow the protest-despair-detachment (PDD) model, which is outlined below.
Aim :
To investigate the effects of short-term separation on children.
Procedure :
Robertson and Bowlby observed children aged 1-4 years old in residential nurseries and filmed their responses when separated for a short period of time from their primary caregivers. Children were therefore observed in a naturalistic environment.
Findings :
It was found that children went through the following three stages when separated from their caregivers.
Protest
Immediate reactions involved crying, kicking, screaming, attempting to stop the caregiver from leaving.
Some rejected comfort and attention from other caregivers (such as the nursery staff) whilst others clung to it.
This stage lasted, depending on the length of the separation, for a few hours or a few weeks.
2. Despair
Children displayed signs of acceptance of the situation, or helplessness. They appeared to be in mourning.
They comforted themselves through thumb-sucking or rocking and withdrew interest in their surroundings or other people.
Individual attachment styles were assessed using the Strange Situation classifications, which showed how much despair the child experienced. The Strange Situation procedure was an experiment conducted by Mary Ainsworth in 1978. She found three main attachment styles in children; secure attachment, insecure-avoidant, and insecure-resistant attachment.
3. Detachment
Children began engaging with others and appeared sociable.
When the caregivers returned, children showed indifference or anger at the caregiver for leaving. This suggests children may have been masking their feelings with outward sociability.
Some children needed to relearn their relationship with the caregiver.
Bowlby noticed that the effects of the short-term separation lasted for several months after the separation ended and even resulted in separation anxiety. Separation anxiety is the fear of being separated from the caregiver in the future.
He also stated that children aged between seven months and three years were the most susceptible to experience long-lasting effects of separation.
Conclusion :
Short-term separations can have negative long-lasting effects similar to those of deprivation. According to Bowlby’s maternal deprivation hypothesis, this can cause long-term social and emotional damage to the child.
It is not necessary that short-term separation leads to social and emotional problems. The conclusions are correlational and there could be multiple factors responsible for the child’s later problems. For example, the quality of care from the caregiver could be responsible for delinquency and / or emotional problems, not necessarily separation.
Research by Clarke and Clarke (1976) shows that children that were subject to severe deprivation were able to recover. This suggests earlier difficulties can be overcome and that effects are not necessarily long-lasting or detrimental.
Not all children go through the stages in the PDD model. Experiences and coping strategies vary significantly depending on age, gender, past experiences, family income and personality. James and Joyce Robertson, between 1967 and 1976, became foster parents for young children experiencing short separations due to the hospitalization of their mothers. They found that the PDD model was not the default response from the children if the quality of care during the separation was good.
However, the Robertsons filmed ‘John’ in 1969; he was then a 17-month-old placed in the care of a residential nursery for nine days. His behavior closely resembled the stages in the PDD model. This shows support for Robertson and Bowlby’s research.
Robertson and Bowlby’s research did not have observer bias as they filmed the children using time-sampling methods . This means they did not simply film the children only when they thought it would help their research. This adds to the validity of the findings.
Research has found that the impact of being deprived of attachment from a caregiver can lead to damage to social, emotional and intellectual development. John Bowlby believed the effects were permanent and irreversible. The findings in his 44 thieves study showed that 12 out of 14 children with affectionless psychopathy were maternally deprived, which supports Bowlby's theory.
Deprivation is where a child's attachment from their mother or other caregiver has been significantly broken due to no care given to the child during that time. It is a period long enough for the bond between the child and caregiver to be seriously damaged.
Separation refers to the temporary absence of the caregiver from the child. Unless separation occurs regularly, it is unlikely that the child will suffer from social and emotional damage. However, deprivation is where the caregiver has been absent for long enough or frequently enough for attachment between the child and caregiver to be significantly damaged or even broken. An example of deprivation is where the child is taken from the caregiver and placed in institutional care.
Separation is where the caregiver is temporarily absent from the child for a short period of time.
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