Text study
III.
Before reading the text on affiliation predict whether the following statements are true or false:
a). The need for social contact is innate.
b). The need for affiliation can occur only during a very limited period of life
c). The development of affection between the infant and the mother is completely determined by the frequency of satisfaction of primary needs
d). The development of a strong attachment between the infant and the person who cares (заботиться) for him is crucial to normal social development.
Now read the text and see whether you were right.
text
How do people acquire their need for social contact? Does it come from mother-child contact? Most writers in this area would agree that human infants form strong and persistent ties to their mother or to some other person who cares for them. From this intimate relationship the child's love for his mother and for other people is formed.
But how does the relationship develop? And how does it come to generalize beyond the original person involved? Clearly, people need more than their mothers if their needs for social contact are to be met. Undeniable (неоспоримо) as the close mother-child relationship is, there is considerable disagreement as to how it comes about and how it develops into a "social response" of wanting to associate with other people. Three very different theories have been given.
Since the original work with imprinting it has been found that imprinting can occur only during a limited period of life (Hess, 1959). It has been suggested that human infants may
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form their social attachment by an imprinting-like process, in which the basic social responses of the infant - sucking (сосание), clinging (прижимание), and smiling - are elicited by the mother (stimulus). Like the mother goose with the goslings in a classic experiment (Lorenz, 1935) the mere (простой) presence of the human mother at a critical time in the infant's life even without any tangible (ощутимый) rewards such as warmth or nourishment (питание) - may result in the formation of an attachment between the infant and his mother.
Interesting as this imprinting theory is, experimental verification with humans is obviously unattainable for ethical reasons. Nevertheless, further testing of the imprinting theory with higher animals, such as chimpanzees [tsimpdn'zi:z], is possible, and could provide further indirect evidence for the possible existence of this phenomenon in human beings.
The learning theory holds that the infant becomes attached to the mother because her face and form have been associated with the alleviation of certain primary drive states, primarily hunger and thirst. Every time a baby is fed (кормить) by his mother, he learns to associate her with the warm, comfortable feelings that come from the relief (облегчение, удовлетворение) of his hunger. In short, the literally millions of times a baby is cared for by his mother or others could be thought of as times when human beings are associated with pleasant situations. Gradually, through this process of conditioning, the child learns to "love" his mother, and this love generalizes to other people. Affection, or the need for others, becomes - as the behaviorists would describe it - a "learned drive" (Dollard and Miller, 1950). Just as a pet kitten learns to "love" its human mother because she feeds him, so does the human infant learns to love his mother because she is constantly associated with pleasant experiences.
If you have had a course in introductory psychology, you do not need to be reminded of the power of the classical
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conditioning in learning. Pavlov's famous dog, which salivated (выделять слюну) when a bell that had been associated with food was rung, has made this process famous.
Conditioning is a pervasive (проникающий всюду) and important learning process and offers a sound explanation of the development of the attachment between mother and child. Another equally plausible ([plo:zibl] правдоподобный) theory is that certain aspects of the mother, such as her warmth and softness, might instinctively set off certain social responses in the human infant, such as smiling, clinging, and sucking. The mother's softness or warmth - not the frequency of her association with any pleasant stimulus - would be responsible for the development of the infant's attachment to her.
These two theories are clearly inconsistent. Whereas the learning theory holds that the development of affection is completely determined by the frequency of pairing primary reinforcements such as food with mother, the instinctive-component theory holds that the development of an attachment is determined by the pairing of certain aspects of the mother - some of which are not yet known - with the infant's social responses. Certain aspects of the mother, such as intimate physical contact, may instinctively arouse affection responses in the infant.
Which of these two theories offers the better explanation? What is most important in the development of the mother-child attachment: the association of the primary drive reduction with the mother or cues ([kju:] сигнал), such as physical contact, that instinctively set off an attachment response? These theories have not been tested directly at the human level. Although designing such a study might be simple enough, there are obviously ethical problems involved in conducting such research with human beings.
To test whether food or contact comfort is more important in the development of affection, one investigator has run a series of experiments using infant macaque [ ma'ka:k] monkeys
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as subjects (Harlow, 1958; 1959; Harlow and Harlow, 1962). These animals are believed to exhibit strong similarities to humans in their basic responses, such as nursing, clinging, and visual and auditory ['o:ditori| exploration.
In an early study two artificial, surrogate "mothers" were constructed. One mother was built of wire mesh (проволочная сетка). A second mother, designed to resemble the first in size and shape, was made of terry cloth (плюш) so that she could provide contact comfort. In one experiment a cloth mother did not dispense milk and a wire mother did. By observing which of the two mothers the infant monkeys spent the most time with, that is, preferred, Harlow felt he could gain some insight into the relative validity of the learning and the instinctive-component theories.
During the 165 - day period that the infant monkeys spent with both mothers, a distinct preference was shown for the cloth mother. By the end of the time period, the baby monkeys were spending an average of sixteen hours per day on the cloth mother as compared to an average of only one and a half hours on the wire mother. Clearly the need for contact comfort produced more of an affiliation response than the need for hunger reduction.
The Harlow experiments, of course, do not settle the issue of how social attachment is learned in human beings. Whether these results show the workings of the imprinting-like process in the forming of attachments in monkeys or a drive for contact comfort that is stronger than the drive for food is, of course, debatable. Nevertheless the results do emphasize the importance of the aspects of the mother, other than her association with food, in eliciting an attachment relationship.
Although these three explanations emphasize different aspects of the learning process, it is possible that in real life all three aspects combine to produce the very strong attachment that usually exists between infants and those who care for them.
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Regardless of how the attachment relationship between the person or persons who care for him is formed, its formation is crucial to normal social development. A number of studies consistently show that social deprivation causes severe disturbances.
Evidently, social interaction is necessary for normal development - even in areas that do not seem to be socially determined, such as paying attention to the environment. Further in the formation of the infant's attachment to the person who takes care of him, we see the core relationship from which all other social relationships and social learning derives.
Notes:
Undeniable as the close mother-child relationship is ..,
Interesting as this imprinting theory is ...
grammatical structure expressing concession (уступка)
как бы ни, насколько бы ни be responsible for - (зд.) быть причиной
IV.
Read the text again and single out the main problems raised and title the text.