Harry Harlow and Mary Ainsworth essay sample

Theory of attachment according to H. Harlow and M. Ainsworth work According to the definition, attachment is a strong emotional bond that connects two people tight. This phenomenon is not reciprocal, so its not a rule that both people involved in it, would feel attached to each other. Usually it occurs between a child and parents, usually mother, because newborns spend most of their time with her. Ainsworth and Harlow are two psychologists that studied the theory of attachment and tried to understand its mechanisms. We can find many similar things in these psychologist’s work: first of all, they both assumed that imprinting is not the only reason that explains attachment, that was based on researches of animals and humans. Both scientists used the same methodology for their researches. Another similarity is both these researchers were supposed that attachment affects a lot human behavior and personality. We can see that both scientists demonstrated the high importance of attachments impact for the persons future behavior. Both Harlow and Ai nsworth researched the connection between baby and mother as the main component of attachment. Scientists suggest that the tight connection and tactile feelings between baby and mother are quite important thing for them both. The main difference between two researchers work is they used different forms of study. Harlows studying included research of monkey’s behavior: he observed their behavior connected to feeding and to their surrogate mother, when Ainsworth was researching human newborns and their attachment to mothers. Mary demonstrated her 20-minutes experiment that was named the Strange Situation. During this experiment, mother and her newborn were exposed to the stranger, who later stays alone with a baby, and later the baby is left alone before reunion with the mother and stranger. Ainsworth supposed that babies are more interested in discovering the world in mothers presence than when they stay with a stranger, so in her work she proved that attachment is a form of security for children. We can see that Harlow worked only with the origin of theory, when Ainsworth expanded the studying of phenomenon and did more complex research. Harlows research was mostly based only on observing behavior during feeding, he didnt pay attention to any other forms of attachment that was done in Ainsworths work. In his work Harlow said that there are 4 types of attachments, when Ainsworth viewed only 3 forms. Another difference is both scientists based their work on different background principles. Harlow mostly used the behaviorist theory, when Ainslows study was based mostly on Freud theory and psychoanalysis principles. Both studies have a lot of similar and different moments, but we can say that both scientists, Ainsworth and Harlow made quite interesting and useful researches that are very important for the further studying of the attachment.