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Insitutionalisation - Coggle Diagram
Insitutionalisation
Zeanah
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Method: Strange Situation; 95 children 12-31 months who had spent most of their lives in institutional care. They were compared to a control group of 50 children who had never experiences institutional care.
Findings: 74% of control group were securely attached - 19% of institutionalised group. 65% of institutional group were classfied with 'disorganised attachment'. 44% of institutionalised group were classified with disinhibited attachment compared to only 20% of controls.
Conclusions: These findings support the view that children who are raised in institutions are less likely to show secure attachments perhaps due to not having a primary attachment figure or even a secondary.
(-) Ethical Issues: He did randomly assign orphans to institutional care or fostering which improves methodology but does raise ethical issues. He is influencing which children will suffer long-term effects of institutionalisation and who will not.
Rutter
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Method: 165 Romanian Orphans adopted in Britain and longitudinally assessed for physical, cognitive and emotional development at 4, 6, 11 and 15 yrs. 52 British children adopted around the same time served as the control group.
Findings: Half of the orphans showed intellectual delay when they came to the UK. At 11 recover rates were related to their age of adoption. Adopted before 6 months = 102 IQ; 6 months to 2 years = 86 IQ; after 2 years = 77 IQ. Disinhibited attachment was apparent in children adopted after 6 months and rare in children adopted before 6 months.
Conclusion: The findings support the view that there is a sensitive period in the development of attachments - a failure to form these attachments before the age of 6 months appears to have long lasting effects in terms of child's IQ and attachment.
(-) Children were not randomly assigned to conditions: Did not interfere with adoption process, so the children adopted early may be naturally more sociable and ones later may be less sociable - confounding variable
Evaluation
(+) Practical Applications: improvements on how children are looked after on institutions - only one or two key workers per child. Adoption process has been shortened.
(+) Reliability of findings: Morison and Elwood found the same results with Romanian Orphans and Canadian parents.
(+) Fewer extraneous variables: previous studies involved children who had experiences significant bereavement, abuse or neglect - was difficult to isolate the effects
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(-) Socially Sensitive Research: Institutionalised and adopted after 6 months are not going to be as intelligent than children who have not been adopted before then. Zeanah claims they're more likely to have insecure attachments.
Effects
Disinhibited Attachment: Child is equally friendly and affectionate towards people they know well or who are strangers - adaption to multiple caregivers.
Intellectual Delay: Institutionalised children often show signs of intellectual delay. This effect is not as pronounced if the children are adopted before 6 months of age
Disorganised Attachment: Institutionalised children may show this. This type cannot be identified as they show signs of all types interchangeably.