Comparison Of John Bowlby's Theory And Mary Ainsworth

Bowlby’s Theory and Mary Ainsworth
John Bowlby is a psychoanalyst who was interested in how mental health or behavioural problems came to be, he attributed this to a person’s early childhood experience, and how they were raised. John Bowlby invented 4 names for different parenting methods, and explained how he believed these parents acted and how this affected the said child in later adulthood. Mary Ainsworth was a student of Bowlby who agreed with his views and developed a very praised and used procedure to discover the attachment style of the child, she called this her “strange situation” test, this test puts an infant in a room and records her reaction with their parent in the room, leaving the room, strangers coming in… They then analyse …show more content…
They may feel no one loves them, and find it hard to socialise because they feel there’s something wrong with them, they don’t know what it is but they just seem to drive everyone away, even though this may not be the case because of the parenting they received they may have this fear all the time of this situation because their parents were really close to them but then became disinterested, this could develop in to allot of social anxiety. This type of parenting can also affect how they parent their own child as well, because of the lack of attention they received they may be desperate for attention from the child and become intrusive in their child’s life, this is also allot to do with the insecurities they developed from their childhood, they may see their child as an object that makes them feel better about themselves. They may even try to live vicariously through their child to make themselves happier in their own life. The intrusive behaviour could be because they recognise their parents ignored them all the time, so being over-attentive may make them be a better parent. They might believe they need to be the best parent to prove their worth, and become a pushy parent compromising their child’s happiness for childhood achievements, medals, awards, and praise off of other