Editing Attachment theory (section)

====Ethology====
Bowlby's attention was drawn to [[ethology]] in the early 1950s when he read [[Konrad Lorenz]]'s work.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bretherton |first=Inge |year=1992 |title=The origins of attachment theory: John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth |url=http://www.psychology.sunysb.edu/attachment/online/inge_origins.pdf |journal=Developmental Psychology |volume=28 |issue=5 |pages=759–775 |doi=10.1037/0012-1649.28.5.759}}</ref>  Other important influences were ethologists [[Nikolaas Tinbergen]] and [[Robert Hinde]].{{sfn|Holmes|1993|p=62}} Bowlby subsequently collaborated with Hinde.<ref name="3 vans">{{cite journal | vauthors = Bowlby J | title = John Bowlby and ethology: an annotated interview with Robert Hinde | journal = Attachment & Human Development | volume = 9 | issue = 4 | pages = 321–35 | date = December 2007 | pmid = 17852051 | doi = 10.1080/14616730601149809 | s2cid = 146211690 }}</ref> In 1953 Bowlby stated "the time is ripe for a unification of psychoanalytic concepts with those of ethology, and to pursue the rich vein of research which this union suggests."<ref name="bowlby 53">{{cite journal | vauthors = Bowlby J |year=1953 |title=Critical Phases in the Development of Social Responses in Man and Other Animals |journal=New Biology |volume=14 |pages=25–32}}</ref> Konrad Lorenz had examined the phenomenon of "[[Imprinting (psychology)|imprinting]]", a behaviour characteristic of some birds and mammals which involves rapid learning of recognition by the young, of a [[wikt:conspecific|conspecific]] or comparable object. After recognition comes a tendency to follow.
[[File:Moose-Imprinting-sr81-15.jpg|thumb|right |alt=A young woman in rubber boots is walking with arms crossed through a muddy clearing in a birch wood, followed by a young moose calf running through a puddle|This bottle-fed young moose has developed an attachment to its caregiver (at [[Kostroma Moose Farm]]).]]

Certain types of learning are possible, respective to each applicable type of learning, only within a limited age range known as a [[critical period]]. Bowlby's concepts included the idea that attachment involved learning from experience during a limited age period, influenced by adult behaviour. He did not apply the imprinting concept in its entirety to human attachment. However, he considered that attachment behaviour was best explained as instinctive, combined with the effect of experience, stressing the readiness the child brings to social interactions.{{sfn|Bowlby|1982|pp=220-23}} Over time it became apparent there were more differences than similarities between attachment theory and imprinting so the analogy was dropped.<ref name="Rutter 95" />

Ethologists expressed concern about the adequacy of some research on which attachment theory was based, particularly the generalization to humans from animal studies.<ref name="crnic">{{cite encyclopedia |year=1982 |title=Animal models of human behavior: Their application to the study of attachment |encyclopedia=The development of attachment and affiliative systems |publisher=Plenum |location=New York |pages=31–42 |isbn=978-0-306-40849-6 |vauthors=Crnic LS, Reite ML, Shucard DW |veditors=Emde RN, Harmon RJ}}</ref><ref name="Brann">{{cite encyclopedia |year=1972 |title=Human non-verbal behaviour: A means of communication |encyclopedia=Ethological studies of child behaviour |publisher=Cambridge University Press | veditors = Blurton-Jones N |pages=37–64 |isbn=978-0-521-09855-7 |quote=...&nbsp;it must be emphasized that data derived from species other than man can be used only to ''suggest'' hypotheses that may be worth applying to man for testing by critical observations. In the absence of critical evidence derived from observing man such hypotheses are no more than intelligent guesses. There is a danger in human ethology&nbsp;... that interesting, but untested, hypotheses may gain the status of accepted theory. [One author] has coined the term 'ethologism' as a label for the present vogue [in 1970]&nbsp;... for uncritically invoking the findings from ethological studies of other species as necessary and sufficient explanations&nbsp;... Theory based on superficial analogies between species has always impeded biological understanding&nbsp;... We conclude that a valid ethology of man must be based primarily on data derived from man, and not on data obtained from fish, birds, or other primates |vauthors=Brannigan CR, Humphries DA}}</ref> Schur, discussing Bowlby's use of ethological concepts (pre-1960) commented that concepts used in attachment theory had not kept up with changes in ethology itself.<ref name="schur">{{cite journal | vauthors = Schur M | title = Discussion of Dr. John Bowlby's paper | journal = The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child | volume = 15 | pages = 63–84 | year = 1960 | pmid = 13749000 | doi = 10.1080/00797308.1960.11822568 | quote = Bowlby&nbsp;... assumes the fully innate, unlearned character of most complex behavior patterns&nbsp;... (whereas recent animal studies showed)&nbsp;... both the early impact of learning and the great intricacy of the interaction between mother and litter"&nbsp;... (and applies)&nbsp;... "to human behavior an instinct concept which neglects the factor of development and learning far beyond even the position taken by Lorenz [the ethological theorist] in his early propositions }}</ref> Ethologists and others writing in the 1960s and 1970s questioned and expanded the types of behaviour used as indications of attachment.<ref name="SchafEm">{{cite journal |vauthors=Schaffer HR, Emerson PE |year=1964 |title=The development of social attachment in infancy |journal=Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, Serial No. 94 |volume=29 |issue=3}}</ref> Observational studies of young children in natural settings provided other behaviours that might indicate attachment; for example, staying within a predictable distance of the mother without effort on her part and picking up small objects, bringing them to the mother but not to others.<ref name="anderson">{{cite encyclopedia |year=1972 |title=Attachment behaviour out of doors |encyclopedia=Ethological studies of child behaviour |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge | veditors = Blurton-Jones N |pages=199–216 |isbn=978-0-521-09855-7 | vauthors = Anderson JW }}</ref> Although ethologists tended to be in agreement with Bowlby, they pressed for more data, objecting to psychologists writing as if there were an "entity which is 'attachment', existing over and above the observable measures."<ref name="jones">{{cite encyclopedia |year=1972 |title=Behaviour of children and their mothers at separation and greeting |encyclopedia=Ethological studies of child behaviour |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge | veditors = Blurton-Jones N |pages=217–48 |isbn=978-0-521-09855-7 |vauthors=Jones NB, Leach GM}}</ref> [[Robert Hinde]] considered "attachment behaviour system" to be an appropriate term which did not offer the same problems "because it refers to postulated control systems that determine the relations between different kinds of behaviour."<ref name="Hinde 82">{{cite book |title=Ethology | vauthors = Hinde R |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1982 |isbn=978-0-00-686034-1 |location=Oxford |page=229}}</ref>