Maternal deprivation reconsidered

Abstract

THE concept of “maternal deprivation” is one that rapidly caught the imagination of both the general public and professional workers. It became widely accepted that severe distortions in a child’s early family life could have long-lasting effects on his later development, and “maternal deprivation” has been thought to be the cause of conditions as diverse as mental subnormality, delinquency, depression, dwarfism, acute distress and affectionless psychopathy l-1, 21. Most writers have recognized that the experiences covered by the term “maternal deprivation” are diverse and complex, but nevertheless there has been a tendency to regard both the experiences and the outcomes as one syndrome which can be discussed as a whole [3]. Thus, in Ainsworth’s critical review of the topic in 1962 [l], the term “deprivation” was repeatedly used in the summary of findings as if it were a single entity, although earlier in the paper she had indicated that it was not. Furthermore, in recent years theorists have been inclined to the view that most of the ills of deprivation are accountable for in terms of lack of an attachment to a mother-figure [l, 4, 5J.t The purpose of this paper is to question these assumptions. It will be suggested that “maternal deprivation” includes many different types of experiences involving lack, loss and distortion; that little progress is likely to occur until the separate effects of each experience are determined [6J; that different psychological mechanisms account for different types of outcome; and finally that the term “maternal deprivation” is misleading in that in most cases the deleterious influences are not specifically tied to the mother and are not due to deprivation. Reference to the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary shows that deprivation means “dispossession” or “loss”. While loss is probably an important factor in one of the syndromes associated with “maternal deprivation” a review of the evidence suggests that in most cases the damage comes from “lack” or “distortion” of care rather than from any form of “loss”. As there are several reviews [l, 2, 6-121 which summarize the findings on the various effects of deprivation and several critiques [6, 13-151 which discuss the assets and deficits of the many studies of maternal deprivation, these aspects of the topic will not be considered here. Instead attention will be focussed on “why” and “how” children are adversely affected by those experiences included under the term “maternal deprivation”; I shall take for granted the extensive evidence that many children admitted to hospital or to a residential nursery show an immediate reaction of acute distress; that many infants show developmental retardation following admission to a poor quality institution and may exhibit intellectual impairment if they remain there for a long time; that there is an association between delinquency and broken homes; that affectionless psychopathy sometimes follows multiple separation experiences and institutional care in early childhood; and that dwarfism is particularly seen in children from rejecting and affectionless homes. The evidence on factors which modify the effects of deprivation has been discussed elsewhere [7] and this