Bowlby argued that the attachment behaviours in both caregivers and babies evolved ensuring the survival of the baby until maturity and reproduce. Babies produce instincts like crying and smiling which encourages the caregiver to look after it. Parents especial mothers as per to Bowlby have instincts to protect their baby from harm and nurture them ensuring their survival until maturity. Those babies and mother who don’t possess these behaviours have been less successful. A second most important concept in Bowlby’s theory was the idea of monotrophy a single attachment to one person who is most important to the baby.
Bowlby begun to explore this. Bowlby (as cited in Oates, 2005) was inspired by this previous ethological work and was interested in linking such findings with human development (Oates, 2005). Bowlby’s focus was children’s attachment during the critical period and the effect it has on later development. Bowlby was influenced by work of Winnicot. Winnicot’s (1953) work on mothers and infants demonstrated the important for mothers to be emotionally ready to be a ‘good enough mother’ by having tolerance of waiting out a child’s frustration and the confidence in providing satisfaction (Oates, 2005).
Babies have social releaser which unlocks the innate tendency for adults to care for them; these are both physical and behavioural social releasers. Bowlby adopted the idea of a critical period from ethologists like Lorenz, and applied this to his explanation of how human infants form their attachments. Bowlby has several claims. The first being that we have evolved a biological need to attach to our main caregiver, this being the monotropy attachment. Forming this attachment has survival values, as staying close to the mother ensure food and protection.
We are all born with an inherited need to form attachments and this is to help us survive. He also said that attachments were irreversible- once they were made they could not be broken. * Babies are biologically programmed to form attachments. By doing cute things lie smiling, they form attachments with adults who look after them when they are most vulnerable, helping the baby survive. This is called social releasers.
Firstly, he imposed that the attachments are innate; i.e. Attachment is biologically pre-programmed into children at birth and are encoded in the human genes, to ensure that they can form relationships with the caregiver. He also argued that there were critical periods for attachment which included the 23rd, 24th and 25th day when the child develops limbs, as well as the second trimester where development of the brain occurs. This period is crucial as, if something goes wrong, the child is likely to suffer from impairments, like schizophrenia. Birth is also another vital period as late or early conception can also lead to impairments, as well as walking and talking which should be learned by the age of 4.
If secured the child will receive ample attention and have basic needs met. However, if unsecured may result in an impaired social and emotional development (Peterson, 2004). In attempts to distinguish between the associated attachment behaviours observed in infant-caregiver interaction, Mary Ainsworth patented the strange situation test; subsequent findings resulted in three categories of infant attachment style; A: insecure avoidant, B: secure and C: insecure resistant (Ainsworth, et al. 1978). This model was later applied to adult romantic relationships and adapted to form theories of adult
For babies and infants this would be the primary care giver, normally the mother. This is called monotropy and to help form this bond infants use things called social releasers which are simply things like giggling or copying others to attract attention, these are positive social releasers things that make you think that you want that to happen again but there are also negative social releasers, such as crying, that make you want them to stop and so you attempt to find and fix the problem. Whatever the differences both kinds achieve their aim of attracting your attention. Bowlby suggested that, like other biological processes, attachment has a Critical period in which to form the bond. He believed that in this case the most likely case scenario was that you had to form an attachment within the first two and a half years of your life or not
Unit CYPCore3.5 - Develop positive relationships with children, young people and others involved in their care 1.1 Explain why positive relationships with children and young people are important and how these are built and maintained Positive relationships with children and young people are important because it is good way of them developing in their earlier years. They are mostly built in the earlier years as most places have key workers, so each member of staff has key children. They can be also built up by finding the Childs interests, how they like being greeted, knowing their sense of humour and taking time to play, talk with the child. Communication in my setting is so important as it is essential that we have
Bowlby put forward the principle of monotropy, believing that the infant displays a strong innate tendency to form an attachment with one significant person, not necessarily, but usually the mother. (Gross, R. 2005). This was criticised by Rutter (1981), who claimed that the mother is not special in the way that the infant shows its attachment, as children will show a whole range of attachment behaviours towards a variety of people. Bowlby (1969), cited in Martin et al 2007 p. 546) claimed that the most important attachment behaviours are sucking, cuddling, looking, smiling and crying. According to Freud the newborn infant lives in a solipsistic world of ‘primary narcissism’ and experiences a build-up of tension with the need to suck the breast as an expression of his infantile sexuality.
First the infant bonds with its mother. It’s during this time it learns to start development of emotions. Erickson’s “Eight Stages of Development” contends that if children don’t have their basic needs for security met early in life, they can become distrustful and fearful. A baby develops a bond of security and trust during the first two years of life, called the nurturing stage. Emotional development should be the most important thing we do for the child.