John Bowlby Attachment Theory Essay

Bowlby’s attachment theory has greatly influenced practice. His theory of attachment explains the importance of having a figure that the child shares a strong bond with. Having an attachment can significantly support a child’s development as Barbara Woods suggests that “his theory of attachment proposed that attachment is innate in both infants and mothers, and that the formation of this attachment is crucial for the infants development” Wood, B (2001, p.53). Bowlby believed that forming an attachment will help a child develop in all areas e.g. emotionally, physical and mentally. However if they did not form an attachment in the sensitive period, the child may have issues or problems in their cognitive, emotional and social development.

Harlow’s developed his studies with orphan’s rhesus monkeys in laboratory. By using two made wire models mothers. One of the wire mothers had a bottle to feed the baby and other, had no bottle, but it was covered on terry-cloth. Harlow observed how important was the bound made by the monkey baby on both surrogate mothers, Babies used the wired with bottle to feed only but the one covered on terry-cloth provided the emotional bound and further on the experiments, the terry-cloth provided confidence and security. (Harlow, H.F. 1962)

John Bowlby had worked with residential school children as a volunteer early on in his career and had determined that the children who suffered the most from anger outbursts, aggressivity, and whom her termed “affectionless” were also the children who had suffered the most maternal deprivation (). Bowlby advanced that the loss of the mother figure was extremely distressing and damaging and could influence adults' behavior years later. Hence, where psychoanalysis had been concerned “solely with the imaginings of the childish mind, the fantasied pleasures and the dreaded retributions” (Fonagy), Bowlby showed that humans do not develop in a void or as “individual monads” but as members of interacting systems. Bowlby developed his theory on attachment for several decades, and at a time where any dealings with childhood trauma were still rigorously influenced by Freudian psychoanalysis through the likes of psychoanalysts such Anna Freud or Melanie Klein. Even Winnicott was “revulsed” upon reading Bowlby's papers (siegel). It certainly was a bitter pill to swallow for psychoanalysts who had been repeating since Freud that the newborn was a little tyrant fighting for oral gratification at the mother's breast and merely clinging on to fulfil sexual instinctual needs. Bowlby's work was thus eschewed for a considerable time, despite his involvement with the World Health Organisation and the considerable empirical weight that was added to his findings by Mary Ainsworth's studies in

John Bowlby created the theory of attachment, this is where he believed that the earliest bonds formed by babies with their parents/care gives have a tremendous impact of their relationships/attachments towards people in their continuous life. Also Bowlby believe that the attachment bond is to keep the infants close to their mother, this is to improve the child’s chances in survival. What is attachment? This is a strong affectionate tie with special people which young babies will make in the early stage of their life e.g. an attachment towards their mum and dad.

In these tests the monkeys were put through various forms of physical and mental stress to monitor how they were affected. Some monkeys were confined to a darkened room (the “pit of despair”, as Harlow called it) for a whole year with no outside contact. Once released, the monkeys were depressed, psychotic, and apathetic to the other sex. In another test, some females monkeys were tied to a “rape rack” and forcefully impregnated. When freed from the rack, the females were too psychologically damaged to care for their young. The goal of these experiments was to further prove that children require love and affection to grow healthily. Based on his results, it seems that Dr. Harlow’s hypotheses were

However the client the loss of significance surrounded her was evident throughout childhood, she experiences lack of friendship because she did not want to associate anyone because of her grieves .However the need for counselling was ignored due to her religious affiliation. The client the loss seems difficult to accept, as she was willing to try understand and acknowledge her needs and try to cope with her loss that was trigger attachment bond. From this perspective from the client the bond that she share with her mother would be difficult to counsel without an understanding of the theory of attachment. Bowlby’s attachment theory (1973, 1988) has stress the important implications for counseling and psychotherapy reference.

After the death of my husband, I have watched my children grapple with grief. At times it seems as if they are in a tug-of-war with God. Losing a loved one has always been a part of life and eventually everyone will go through a time when they will have to grapple with grief. The death of a father at any age can be devastating, but when children lose their father at a young age their feelings of security disappear. If children lose their attachment to their father they are left wondering if they can even trust to put that attachment somewhere else due to the fear of losing it again. Children grieve differently than adults.

Modifications of Bowlby's Attachment Theory Bowlby's original theory of attachment was concerned with the bonding relationship that develops between an infant and his primary caregiver. He believed the process of bonding to have a biological basis as the genes of those infants who successfully sought the protection of a caregiver (from predators and other dangers) will have survived and been passed on. Bowlby also formulated the Maternal Deprivation hypothesis (1953) which is associated with his theory of attachment and resulted from a study on delinquent boys. Bowlby found that many of these boys shared a history of institutionalised care and concluded that infants need to bond with and maintain a

Attachment Theory, made known by John Bowlby, is a theory dissecting the behaviourisms of humans and animals with others and the reasoning behind them. Bowlby created three main types of attachment one may experience with another. The first type of attachment is secure attachment. This attachment entails that the mother and the child have a healthy emotional bond. For this to happen, the mother and or father comfort the baby by means of “bodily centric and verbal communication” (Boyd, 2013).

When researching treatments for addiction, it is safe to say that because all addicts are unique there will not be a solution that is equally effective for all. There for we must take a relative look at what is measurable. In relation to comorbid psychological conditions, when addicts were screened for lifetime histories of interpersonal trauma instead of PTSD, rates rose from 30-59% up to 55-99% (Padykula, 2010). These alarming rates force us to take a second look at what exactly is the disease of addiction. Is it a mental disease that can be solved with psychoactive drugs, a physiological disease that cannot be cured and only maintained like cancer, or as Padykula put it; an attempt to regulate one’s attachment system in the

Attachment theory in psychology originates with the seminal work of John Bowlby (1958) who was a child psychiatrist who treated many emotionally disturbed children. This led Bowlby to formulate his attachment theory. Working with James Robertson (1952) they observed that children experienced distress when they were separated from their mothers, this anxiety did not dissipate even when an additional caregiver fed the child. The theory suggests that children come into the world pre-programmed to form attachments with others because this will help them to survive. He viewed the first three years as a very sensitive period

John Bowlby’s attachment theory established that an infant’s earliest relationship with their primary caregiver or mother shaped their later development and characterized their human life, “from the cradle to the grave” (Bowlby, 1979, p. 129). The attachment style that an infant develops with their parent later reflects on their self-esteem, well-being and the romantic relationships that they form. Bowlby’s attachment theory had extensive research done by Mary Ainsworth, who studied the mother-infant interactions specifically regarding the theme of an infant’s exploration of their surrounding and the separation from their mother in an experiment called the strange situation. Ainsworth defined the four attachment styles: secure,

John Bowlby, a pioneer in child development, coined attachment theory as a framework to explain human behavior and drives. As Schwartz (2015) points out: “Bowlby framed attachment theory in terms of a human drive for attachment with the basic underlying determinant of human psychology being the success or failure of human interpersonal relationships” (Schwartz, 2015, p. 256). It is important to note that Bowlby’s attachment theory supported that “internal working models of relating exist as templates and are encoded at the limbic level” (Flores, 2010, p. 558). These mannerisms are observable to others but not always available for conscious recall to the individual due to nonconscious implicit memory (Flores, 2010). The goal of group therapy

Throughout the life span, attachment style is consistent; the theory of attachment, created by John Bowlby, describes attachment as “the lasting psychological connectedness between human beings” (McLeod). Attachment style forms during childhood through early school years and accommodates for experience and the environment we immerse in (Feeney & Noller, 281). Through careful study, the three different attachment styles serve as a predictor for romantic adult relationships or attachment styles. The three different attachment styles include secure, avoidant, and anxious/ambivalent. A secure attachment is when comfort is found in relationships, and there is the ability to seek support from the partner. An avoidant attachment style is consistent with a greater sense of autonomy and emotional avoidance from the partner. An anxious/ambivalent attachment style fears rejection and desires strong closeness with the partner ("What’s Your Attachment Style?”).

One of the key theorists of attachment is John Bowlby and his ‘Attachment theory". Bowlby believed ‘the attachment of a caregiver is an inherited mechanism to