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Discovering Love Harry Harlow. Background on Love Theories. Freudian Theory Focused on the bond between you and your mother beginning at the first moment of birth is first experience of love. Focused on oral tendencies Behaviorist Theory All human behavior is associated with primary needs.
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Background on Love Theories • Freudian Theory • Focused on the bond between you and your mother beginning at the first moment of birth is first experience of love. • Focused on oral tendencies • Behaviorist Theory • All human behavior is associated with primary needs. • Examples: Hunger, thirst and avoidance of pain • Because the mom can provide these needs the child becomes attached.
Background on Love Theories • Harlow’s Theory • Love and affection are stronger than primary needs. • Most Prevalent Theory • Most psychologists agree that your experiences as an infant with closeness and attachment to your mother have an important influence on your abilities to love later in life.
Harlow’s Study • Surrogate mothers placed in separate cubicles and attached to monkeys cage. • Eight infant monkeys randomly assigned to two groups. • One group had Cloth mother equipped with a feeder. • Second group had wire mother equipped with a feeder. • Amount of time they spent in direct contact with each mother was recorded for the first five months of their lives.
Cloth Mother: Smooth wooden body covered in sponge rubber and terry cloth. Wire Mother: Made out of wire mesh and considered by Harlow to have no contact comfort.
Results • After the first few days all the monkeys, regardless of which mother had the milk, were spending nearly all their time each day on the cloth mother. • Monkeys being fed by wire mother only left the cloth mother for a short time to get food. • This demonstrated the importance of contact comfort.
After this study Harlow wanted to explore the effects of attachment and contact comfort in greater detail. • Harlow placed various objects in the cage that would cause a fearful reaction. (Wind up drum playing toy bear) • Responses of the monkeys were observed and recorded. • Results • Whenever the monkeys found it frightening they ran to the cloth mother for comfort. • As the monkeys age increased the response became even stronger.
Open Field Test • After six months of being in contact with the surrogate mothers Harlow wanted to see if attachments were formed after periods of separation. • Separated for a short period of time and then reunited • Monkeys placed in a small unfamiliar room containing various objects. • Wooden blocks, blankets, folded piece of paper • Things monkeys like to play with and manipulate • Situations • Cloth mother present • Wire mother present • No mother present
Results • If cloth mother was present the monkeys ran immediately to the cloth mother. Would eventually look at an object for a while and run to cloth mother again.
Results • Without the cloth mother the monkeys would freeze with fear, start crying, crouching and thumb sucking. • When wire mother was present the monkeys would act the same as the no mother condition.
Conclusions • Bonding appears to be more important than food. • Went against what was thought of at the time • Harlow theorized that because the key to successful parenting is contact comfort, then males are just as able to care for a child as women. • This offered hope for adoptive parents and day care centers.
Discussion Questions • Can monkeys behaviors be comparable to humans? Why or Why not? • Do you think this study was a good representation of love attachment versus primary needs attachment? • Do you feel attachment as a child is a predictor of how you will love later in life? • Do you side with the Freudian perspective of attachment as a child due to oral fixation?
