According to Bowlby, “Mother Love in Infancy Is Just as Important for a Child’s Mental Health, as Vitamins and Minerals Are for Physical Health” Discuss This Quotation in Relation to Relevant Attachment Research and Theory.

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According to Bowlby, “Mother love in infancy is just as important for a child’s mental health, as vitamins and minerals are for physical health” Discuss this quotation in relation to relevant attachment research and theory. Contained within the above topic that our discussion will address, is a quote from psychologist Dr John Bowlby. It originally appeared in a World Health Organization (WBA) commissioned report that was written by Bowlby in 1951. Bowlby also had his findings published in paperback form, which was titled ‘Maternal Care and Mental Health’. In which he offered his hypothesis on attachment and its importance between mother and child. In the following chapters we will explore what exactly he is stating, what is mother love? When he talks about its importance on a ‘child’s mental health’, what assertions is he making and do others agree with him, do they accept his techniques and hypothesis? Bowlby’s report was controversial but it influenced changes within health care, social work and in parenting. His report was influenced by Lorenz’s (1935) ethological studies of imprinting and his subsequent theory that attachment was innate. He also considered the findings of R, A, Spitz (1945) who found that bereaved children who lost a parent suffered from deep depression and slow development. He added some studies of his own the most prominent being his study on juvenile delinquency. He studied two groups of disturbed teenagers. One group consisted of forty-four juveniles who were guilty of past theft and another group of forty-four who were not. Bowlby researched their family history and discovered that seventeen of the group guilty of theft experienced a period of separation from their mothers in their infancy. Only two of the remaining group experienced the same separation. Bowlby therefore deduced that mother and child separation in infancy could result

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