Essay Sample on Attachment Theory

It is one of the methods John Bowlby developed in the 60's which expressed his ideas about the primary motivational system. About evolutionary theory, he suggested that helpless infants are to seek comfort and protection of a caregiver to survive. In his opinion, therefore, a secure base instead of love or nurturance is the basis of future development for any infant. Mary Ainsworth, a student of Bowlby, designed a study that aimed at distinguishing children by their attachment style. In this study known as "the strange situation," a year old infants were separated from their mothers then later reunited. In this research, Ainsworth discovered that the point of significance in her observation was the part where the child and the mother got reunited. The issue was of contention is the security of the relationship at the point when the child meets the mother at the reunion. She recognized the babies' behavior when their parents came back into the room after separation. Most of them who cried and protested during separation were quiet and reached for their mothers when they returned to the chamber. This kind of relationship, Ainsworth named "security attached." The rest who showed different behavior were tagged "insecurely attached." The insecurely attached, she divided into subtypes of ambivalent and avoidants. Another student of Ainsworth continued with the study of strategies of attachment. Mary Main identified several problems with the attachment strategies that she named "disorganized." To rectify these chaotic policies, she developed an assessment tool she called as the Adult Attachment Inventory. The main reason for developing this inventory was to capture the quality and types of attachment relationships a mother has to her mother. Mary's tool after that has been used to identify and predict the attachment style. An alternative approach to AT relationship is by the microanalysis of mother-infant face-to-face communication. This theory allows for the complexity of life to enter the equation such as infant temperament, sensory profile, and developmental immaturity. In another theory Beyond the paper principle, Bowlby believes that changing environment can dispel ghosts. He explains his point by referring to rhesus monkeys and puppies. By using the experiment, he confirms that a sensitive period exists that allow the formation of attachment or not. Animals kept away from contact with others for the first six months showed little chances of social interactions recovery. From this animal experiments, he postulated that attachment or lack of it acts in a similar way in infants. A baby who can not show any form of sensitivity is likely not to sensitivity to her children as well. The ghost of her past will reappear in her future giving her no chance to do the opposite of her earlier character. The basis of Bowlby's theory is to an emphasis on the fact that attachment is an evolutionary process helping infants to survive. On Bowlby's research encompassing young thieves, he highlights the link existing between hostile and neurotic mothers that lead to the upbringing of delinquent children or even affectionless characters. In his statement, he says that delinquent children will and satisfy their libido missing, from object-relationships. An infant will build an internal working model acting as a template for relationships to come in the future. We, therefore, realize that the compulsion to repeat is not just enacted from generation to the other but also in love and relationships. Attachment theory is, therefore, able to give an explanation on how an individual can adapt to social situations.

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Humanistic Theory

Psychologists of the 20th century believed that behaviors of people are determined by their rewards and punishment. Their view was that everyone is a product of conditioning. Maslow never liked these views on humans and believed that humans had greater potentials than other organisms. In his opinion, he recognized the fact that humans were far much better than just receiving rewards, punishments, and arguments. From his line of thought, humanistic psychology came into existence. This psychology mainly focuses on the potential of human beings to achieve or become whatever they are capable of doing. Humanistic theory later entered into life through Carl Rogers. Along with Maslow's point of view, Rogers' theory focuses on individual choices. Rogers based his argument upon the foundation of personality development on humanistic psychology together with other ideas on subjective experience. According to the theory, a person will tend to react to changes in their phenomenal fields. He believed that each and every behavior is as a result of motivation through processes of self-actualizing tendencies that are the driving force for anyone to achieve the highest level. As a result of interaction between the surrounding and other people, an individual conceptualize a structure of self-perspective. In any case, an individual has a self-concept, they tend to feel good about themselves whereas if they have negative conceptions towards themselves, they tend to feel uncomfortable and unhappy. In his description of life, Rogers agreed on the matter that principles define life rather than stages of development. The laws themselves exist in the form of running processes rather than static states. His claim was that a fully functional individual continually aims at achieving his potential in the processes leading to good life. His finding was that fully working people have traits like An increased openness to experience, having an existential lifestyle, an increase in organismic trust, freedom of choice, high creativity level, reliability and a wealthy-full life. All the same, like any other theory, Roger's theory was criticized for a reason of lacking empirical evidence in his research. His holistic approach towards humanism allows a large amount of variation yet does not identify enough variables searchable with lots of accuracies. Psychologists are as well worried that such extreme focus on any form of subjective experience of an individual will do microscopic to the appreciating impact of society on personality development.

Carl Rogers Client- Centered Therapy Approach

This method requires a client to take an active role in his or her treatment regime. The therapist must be nondirective and supportive in his case. The client's work will, therefore, be to determine the course and direction of treatment. The therapist on his side has to clarify on the customer's responses to promote self-understanding. This therapy is mainly conducted to improve self-esteem and openness to experience. The state of client-centered therapy is a state of incongruence. Having self-concept is, therefore, the key to effective client-centered therapy. The therapists attitude more than anything else, is, therefore, imperative in this process. The theory includes several propositions. Considering the inclusion of these proposals in a chronological flow narrative, it would appear as:

Carl: All individuals are existing in a continually changing world of experience of which they form the center.

Client: I will make sense of myself, of others and the world based on my own constantly shifting experiences.

Carl: Organisms will react to the field as it is always experienced which is the perpetual reality for an individual.

Client: My sense of reality is unique and formed from what I experience plus how I process and understand this experience.

Carl: organisms react as a whole organization to whatever field.

Client: My entire way of being arises from my personal sense of reality.

Carl: A portion of the total perceptual field would gradually become differentiated as self.

Client: Part of my reality is my sense of self.

Carl: As a result of interaction with the environment, a structure of the human person is formed in an organized pattern.

Client: I consider my sense of self as fluid and inconsistent perception. I attach values to those perceptions.

Carl: The organism has one basic tendency of surviving and striving and maintains experience.

Client: I have an innate pulse of caring for myself, to heal and to grow.

Carl: The best vantage point of understanding any form of behavior is from the internal frame of reference of an individual.

Client: you have the ability to adequately understand my behavior only by understanding how I see myself, how I see others and how I see the world.

Carl: Behavior is the goal-directed attempt of any organism to fulfill its need as per the experience in the field perceived.

Client: My behavior is in order of meeting my needs as I experience and understand them.

Carl: most of the behaving that is adopted by organisms are consistent with life concept

Client: I behave in a way that is consistent to how I perceive myself.

Carl: In some instances, the behavior may be brought about by live experiences in conjunction with those needs not yet symbolized. Such behavior must be an inconsistency with the self-structure.

Client: Underlying experiences and needs that I deny will tend to leak into my behavior and of which will be less consistent with how I see myself.

Carl: As any individual would perceive and accept into his structure and more of his live experiences, he finds out that he is replacing his present value system.

Client: At the point when I can reshape the view of myself and my world to incorporate denied experiences I begin reshaping my values.

Principle of Behaviorism in the Modern World

Behaviorism is a trend in the field of psychology. It directly takes after functionalism which focuses on the biological significance of natural processes. The theory of behaviorism rejects the nature of mental events. In definition, therefore, behaviorism is the study of existing relationship between individuals surrounding and their behavior without the consultation of possible events occurring within human minds. It maintains an objective stance ensuring that research findings will be valid and capable of being relied upon by anyone. Behaviorism has strict limitations which occur outside the confined world of behavior. Illustrations of behaviorism can include: Parents tending to use a reward system when training children. Each time a behavior is done right by a child like sitting on the potty or having a dry diaper in the morning the parent gives something as a form of appreciation. The primary objective is to coax children to keep up the good behavior since he or she wants to earn the reward. Eventually, the behavior becomes a habit. Secondly, companies offer raises and salary increment to employees who exhibit excellent performances which serve as techniques of motivating the employees to do their jobs better. In another example, a four-year-old Emma has a chore chart including such behaviors as making her bed, getting dressed, brushing her teeth and even taking her breakfast plate to the sink. When she completes her chores, she earns a sticker on her chore chart. Once she achieves five labels, she picks what the family will have for dessert. In another, Mrs. Smith's second-grade class is behaving a dismally. She decides to develop a management system for development of behavior her students in the hope that it will motivate them to behave properly. By timing hourly, if the students have followed the rules at an acceptable level, Mrs. Smith puts a tally mark on the board. If the day ends faults when they are more than more than five tally marks, Mrs. Smith draws a star on the board. When the students achieve ten stars, they get a pizza party. She hopes that the incentive of a pizza party will motivate them to follow the rules. All but are examples of positive reinforcements. Examples of negative reinforcements include: If a student finds hi...