Amer. J . Orthopsychiut. 52(4).

October 1982

ATTACHMENT AND LOSS:

Retrospect and Prospect
John Bowlby, M.D.

Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist, Tavistock Clinic, London

~ ~

An historical sketch of the manner in which evidence has accumulated

showing the ill effects of separation, loss, and maternal deprivation during
the early years, and of how, in the light of this evidence, a new conceptual
framework, ofren referred to a s attachment theory, has been formulated f o r
understanding personality development and psychopathology.

w hen the American Orthopsychiat-

ric Association honored me by
conferring on me the Fourth Blanche F.
field I have been exploring, how we ar-
rived at that knowledge, and the direc-
tions that further research might take.
Ittleson Memorial Award, I gave a brief, Since I am in no position to be an objec-
informal account of the way my ideas tive historian in a field that is only now
had developed over the years. In doing ceasing to be controversial, my aim
so I was especially glad to have an op- must be more modest. All I can attempt
portunity to express the deep gratitude I is to describe the story as I recall it and a
feel for the generous support given to me few of the empirical studies and
and to my research group by a number of theoretical ideas that have been influen-
American foundations, and to express tial in shaping it. My personal biasses
also my deep indebtedness to the col- will be everywhere evident.*
leagues with whom I have worked and
without whose help I could have done * The origins ofmy interests, and why I selected
very little. In this article the editor has separation of young child from mother-figure as a
suggested I attempt something different point of entry for systematic research into the
broader field of the influence of family experience
and very much harder, namely, to give on personality development, are described in two
an account of what we know today in the recent publications.'8,*"

Bused o t i the Fourth Atinrrul Blunche F . Ittleson Memoriul Lectttre. presented (it the Presidentid
Session of the Americitn Orthopsychiutric Associution's 1981 trntiirul meeting. in Nenj Yorl;.

664 0002-94321821040664-1 5$00.75 0 1982 American Orthopsychiatric Association, Inc.

JOHN BOWLBY 665

EARLY WORK tion in 1950gave me the chance not only

During the 1930s and ’40s a number of to read the literature and to discuss it
clinicians on both sides of the Atlantic, with the authors but also to meet many
mostly working independently of each others in Europe and the United States
other, were making observations of the with experience in the field. Soon after
ill-effects on personality development the end of my contract I submitted my
of prolonged institutional care or fre- report,I2 in which I reviewed the far
quent changes of mother-figure during from negligible evidence then available
the early years of life. Influential publi- regarding the adverse influences on per-
cations followed, including, in alpha- sonality development of inadequate
betical order, publications by Ben- maternal care during early childhood,
der,8* Bowlby,Io*l 1 Burlingham and called attention to the acute distress of
Freud,2s*2 h Goldfarb,-”-3BLevy,S2and young children who find themselves
Spitz.”, 72 Since each of the authors was separated from those they know and
a qualified analyst (except for Goldfarb, love, and made recommendations of
who trained later), it is no surprise that how best to avoid, or at least mitigate,
the findings created little stir outside an- the short-term and the long-term ill ef-
alytical circles. fects.
Late in 1949, an imaginative young Influential though the written word
British psychiatrist, analytically ori- may often be, it has nothing like the
ented and recently appointed to be emotional impact of a movie. Through-
Chief of the Mental Health Section of out the 1950s, Spitz’s early film, Grief:A
the World Health Organization, stepped Peril in I n f ~ l n c y . soon
~~ followed by
in. Requested to contribute to a United Robertson’s A Two- Yeur-Old Goes to
Nations study of the needs of homeless Hospital, 64 together had an enormous
children, Ronald Hargreaves* decided influence. Not only did they draw the
to appoint a short-term consultant to re- attention of professional workers to the
port on the mental health aspects of the immediate distress and anxiety of young
problem and, knowing of m y interest in children in an institutional setting, but
the field, invited me to undertake the they proved powerful instruments for
task. For me this was a golden opportu- promoting changes in practice. In this
nity. After five years as an army psychi- field, Robertson was to play a leading
atrist, I had returned to child psychiatry part.”, hh
determined to explore further the prob- Although by the end of the 1950s a
lems I had begun working on before the great many of those working in child
war; and I had already appointed as psychiatry and psychology and in social
my first research assistant James work, and some also of those in pediat-
Robertson, a newly qualified psychiat- rics and nursing, had accepted the re-
ric social worker who had worked with search findings and were implementing
Anna Freud in the Hampstead Nurse- change, the sharp controversy aroused
ries during the war. The six months I by the early publications and films con-
spent with the World Health Organiza- tinued. Psychiatrists trained in tra-

* Hargreaves’s premature death in 1%2, when professor of psychiatry at Leeds, was a grievous
loss to preventive psychiatry.
666 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

ditional psychiatry and psychologists ’ ~ O Sof, Harlow’s studies of the effects of

who adopted a learning theory approach maternal deprivation on rhesus mon-
never ceased to point to the deficiencies keys; once again film played a big part.
of the evidence and to the lack of an Harlow’s work in the United States had
adequate explanation of how the types been stimulated by Spitz’s reports. In
of experience implicated could have the the United Kingdom complementary
effects on personality development that studies by Hinde had been stimulated by
were claimed. Many psychoanalysts, in our work at the Tavistock. For the next
addition, especially those whose theory decade a stream of experimental results
focused on the role of fantasy in from those two scientists,39*44 coming
psychopathology to the relative exclu- on top of the Ainsworth review, under-
sion of the influence of real life events, mined the opposition. Thereafter, little
remained unconvinced and sometimes more was heard of the inherent im-
very critical. Meanwhile, research con- plausibility of our hypotheses, and crit-
tinued. For example, at Yale, Provence icism became more constructive.
and Liptodl were making a systematic Much, of course, remained uncertain.
study of institutionalized infants, in Even if the reality of short-term distress
which they compared their development and behavioral disturbance is granted,
with that of infants living in a family. At what evidence is there, it was asked,
the Tavistock members of my small re- that the ill effects can persist? What
search group were active collecting features of the experience, or combina-
further data on the short-term effects on tion of features, are responsible for the
a young child of being in the care of distress? And, should it prove true that
strange people in a strange place for in some cases ill effects do persist, how
weeks and sometimes months at a is that to be accounted for? How does it
time,41* 4 2 whilst I addressed myself to happen that some children seem to come
the theoretical problems posed by our through very unfavorable experiences
data. relatively unharmed? How important is
The field was continually changing. it that a child should be cared for most of
One important influence was the publi- the time by one principal caregiver? In
cation in 1962 by the World Health Or- less developed societies, it was claimed
ganization of a collection of articles in (wrongly, as it turns out), multiple
which the manifold effects of the various mothering is not uncommon. In addition
types of experience covered by the term to all these legitimate questions, more-
“deprivation of maternal care” were re- over, there were misunderstand-
assessed. Of the six articles, by far the ings. Some supposed that advocates
most comprehensive was that by my of the view that a child should be
colleague Ainsworth.’ In it she not only cared for most of the time by a principal
reviewed the extensive and diverse evi- mother-figure held that that had to be
dence and considered the many issues the child’s natural mother-the so-
that had given rise to controversy but called blood-tie theory. Others sup-
also identified a large number of prob- posed that, in advocating that a child
lems requiring further research. should “experience a warm intimate and
A second important influence was the continuous relationship with his mother
publication, beginning during the late (or permanent mother-substitute),” pro-
JOHN BOWLBY 667

ponents were prescribing a regime in ever, the one advocated by Melanie

which a mother had to care for her child Klein, mother’s breast is postulated as
24 hours a day, day in and day out, with the first object, and the greatest empha-
no respite. In a field in which strong sis is placed on food and orality and on
feelings are aroused and almost every- the infantile nature of “dependency.”
one has some sort of vested interest, None of these features matched my ex-
clear unbiased thinking is not always perience of children. But if the current
easy. dependency theories were inadequate,
what was the alternative?
A NEW LOOK AT THEORY During the summer of 1951 a friend
The monograph, Maternal Care and mentioned to me the work of Lorenz on
Mental Health,’Zis in two parts. The the following responses of ducklings and
first reviews the evidence regarding the goslings.53 Reading about this and re-
adverse effects of maternal deprivation, lated work on instinctive behavior re-
the second discusses means for pre- vealed a new world, one in which sci-
venting it. What was missing, as several entists of high caliber were investigating
reviewers pointed out, was my explana- in nonhuman species many of the prob-
tion of how experiences subsumed lems with which we were grappling in
under the broad heading of maternal de- the human, in particular the relatively
privation could have the effects on per- enduring relationships that develop in
sonality development of the kinds many species, first between young and
claimed. The reason for this omission parents and later between mated pairs,
was simple: the data were not accom- and some of the ways in which these
modated by any theory then current and developments can go awry. Could this
in the brief time of my employment by work, I asked myself, cast light on a
WHO there was no possibility of devel- problem central to psychoanalysis, that
oping a new one. of “instinct” in humans?
Next followed a long phase during
The Child‘s Tie to the Mother which I set about trying to master basic
At that time it was widely held that the principles and to apply them to our
reason a child develops a close tie to his problems, starting with the nature of the
mother is that she feeds him. Two kinds child‘s tie to his mother. Here Lorenz’s
of drive are postulated, primary and work was of special interest. It showed
secondary. Food is thought of as pri- that in some animal species a strong
mary; the personal relationship, re- bond to an individual mother-figure
ferred to as “dependency,” as secon- could develop without the intermediary
dary. This theory did not seem to me t o of food: for these young birds are not fed
fit the facts. For example, were it true, by parents but feed themselves by
an infant of a year or two should take catching insects. Here then was an al-
readily to whomever feeds him and this ternative model to the traditional one,
clearly was not the case. An alternative and one that had a number of features
theory, stemming from the Hungarian that seemed possibly to fit the human
school of psychoanalysis, postulated a case. Thereafter, as my grasp of
primitive object relation from the begin- ethological principles increased and I
ning. In its best known version, how- applied them to one clinical problem
668 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

after another, 1 became increasingly those data, I have started with observa-
confident that this was a promising ap- tions of the behavior of children in cer-
proach. Thus, having adopted this novel tain sorts of defined situations, includ-
point of view, I decided to “follow it up ing records of the feelings and thoughts
through the material as long as the appli- they express, and have tried to build a
cation of it seems to yield results” (to theory of personality development from
borrow a phrase of Freud’s). there. Other difficulties arise from my
From 1957, when The Nature o f t h e use of concepts such as control system
Child’s Tie t o His MotherI3 was first (instead of psychic energy) and devel-
presented, through 1969, when Attach- opmental pathway (instead of libidinal
rnentt6 appeared, until 1980, with the phase) which, although now firmly es-
publication of Loss, l 9 I concentrated on tablished as key concepts in all the
this task. The resulting conceptual biological sciences, are still foreign to
framework* is designed to accommo- the thinking of a great many psycholo-
date all those phenomena to which gists and clinicians.
Freud called attention-for example, Having discarded the secondary
love relations, separation anxiety, drive, dependency theory of the child’s
mourning, defense, anger, guilt, depres- tie to his mother, and also the Kleinian
sion, trauma, emotional detachment, alternative, a first task was to formulate
sensitive periods in early life-and so to a replacement. This led to the concept of
offer an alternative to the traditional attachment behavior as a special class of
metapsychology of psychoanalysis and behavior with its own dynamics distinct
to add yet another to the many variants from the behavior and dynamics of
of the clinical theory now extant. How either feeding or sex, the two sources of
successful these ideas will prove only human motivation long regarded as the
time will tell. most fundamental. Strong support for
As Kuhn has emphasized, any novel this step soon came from Harlow’s
conceptual framework is difficult to finding that, in another primate species
grasp, especially so for those long -rhesus macaques-infants show a
familiar with a previous one. Of the marked preference for a soft dummy
many difficulties met with in under- “mother,” despite its providing no
standing the framework advocated, I food, to a hard one that does provide
describe only afew. One is that, instead food.40
of starting with a clinical syndrome of Attachment behavior is any form of
later years and trying to trace its origins behavior that results in a person attain-
retrospectively, I have started with a ing or maintaining proximity to some
class of childhood traumata and tried to other clearly identified individual who is
trace their sequelae prospectively. A conceived as better able to cope with the
second is that, instead of starting with world. It is most obvious whenever the
the private thoughts and feelings of a person is frightened, fatigued, or sick,
patient, as expressed in free associ- and is assuaged by comforting and
ations or play, and trying to build a caregiving. At other times the behavior
theory of personality development from is less in evidence. Nevertheless, the

* This is the term Kuhn recently used“ to replace “paradigm.” the term he used in his earlier work.‘O
JOHN BOWLBY

knowledge that an attachment figure is attachment was first advanced as a

available and responsive provides a useful way of conceptualizing a form of
strong and pervasive feeling of security, behavior of central importance not only
and so encourages the person to value to clinicians and to developmental psy-
and continue the relationship. Whilst chologists but to every parent as well.
attachment behavior is at its most obvi- During that time attachment theory has
ous in early childhood, it can be ob- been greatly clarified and amplified. The
served throughout the life cycle, espe- most notable contributors have been
cially in emergencies. Since it is seen in Hinde, who, in addition to his own pub-
virtually all human beings (though in lication~,~'has constantly guided my
varying patterns), it is regarded as an own thinking, and Ainsworth who,
integral part of human nature and one starting in the late ' ~ O S has
, pioneered
we share (to a varying extent) with empirical studies of attachment behav-
members of other species. The biologi- ior both in Africa2* and in the U.S.,6-'
cal function attributed to it is that of and has also helped greatly to develop
protection. To remain within easy ac- theory.4* Her work, together with that
cess of a familiar individual known to be of her students and others influenced
ready and willing to come to our aid in an by her,22* 7s has led attachment
ssp 749

emergency is clearly a good insurance theory to be widely regarded as proba-

policy, whatever our age. bly the best supported theory of
By conceptualizing attachment in this socioemotional development yet avail-
way, as a fundamental form of behavior able.59. 62. 69
with its own internal motivation distinct Because my starting point in devel-
from feeding and sex, and of no less oping theory was observations of be-
importance for survival, the behavior havior, some clinicians23* have as-
and motivation are accorded a theoreti- sumed that the theory amounts to no
cal status never before given them- more than a version of behaviorism.
though parents and clinicians alike have This perception is due in large part to the
long been intuitively aware of their im- unfamiliarity of the conceptual frame-
portance. Hitherto the concepts of "de- work proposed and in part to my own
pendency" and "dependency need" failure in early formulations to make
have been used to refer to them, but clear the distinction to be drawn be-
these terms have serious disadvantages. tween an attachment and attachment
In the first place, dependency has a behavior. To say of a child (or older
pejorative flavor; in the second, it does person) that he is attached to, or has an
not imply an emotionally charged re- attachment to, someone means that he is
lationship to one or a very few clearly strongly disposed to seek proximity to
preferred individuals; and, in the third, and contact with that individual and to
no valuable biological function has ever do so especially in certain specified
been attributed to it. conditions. The,disposition to behave in
It is now 25 years since the notion of this way is an attribute of the attached
* Judging by publications cited, Brody's criticismszJseem to have been made without having studied the
third volume ofAmc./inrcwr t r d I . o s s . I y in which the structural properties of the theory are most fully
described. Likewise. the rather similar criticisms by Kernberg4' appear to have been made without his
having studied the second" or thirdnYvolumes.
670 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

person, a persisting attribute that done than to use these well-understood

changes only slowly over time and that principles to account for a different form
is unaffected by the situation of the mo- of homeostasis, namely one in which the
ment. Attachment behavior, by con- set-limits concern the organism’s rela-
trast, refers to any of the various forms tion to clearly identified persons in, or
of behavior that the person engages in other features of, the environment and
from time to time to obtain or maintain a in which the limits are maintained by
desired proximity. behavioral instead of physiological
There is abundant evidence that al- means.
most every child habitually prefers one In thus postulating the existence of an
person, usually the mother-figure, to internal psychological organization with
turn to when in distress but, in her a number of highly specific features,
absence, will make do with someone which include representational models
else, preferably someone well known to of the self and of attachment figure(s),
the child. On these occasions most chil- the theory proposed can be seen as
dren show a clear hierarchy of prefer- having all the same basic properties as
ence so that, in extremity and with no those that characterize other forms of
one else available, even a kindly structural theory, of which the variants
stranger may be approached. Thus, of psychoanalysis are some of the best
whilst attachment behavior may in dif- known, and that differentiate them so
fering circumstances be shown to a vari- sharply from behaviorism in its many
ety of individuals, an enduring attach- forms. Historically, attachment theory
ment, or attachment bond, is confined to was developed as a variant of object re-
very few. A child who fails to show such lations theory.
clear discrimination is likely to be se- The reason that I have given so much
verely disturbed. space in this account to the concept and
The theory of attachment is an at- theory of attachment is that, once those
tempt to explain both attachment be- principles are grasped, there is little dif-
havior, with its episodic appearance and ficulty in understanding how the many
disappearance, and also the enduring other phenomena of central concern to
attachments that children and other in- clinicians are explained within the
dividuals make to particular others. In framework proposed.
this theory the key concept is that of
behavioral system. This is conceived on Separation Anxiety
the analogy of a physiological system For example, a new light is thrown on
organized homeostatically to ensure that the problem of separation anxiety,
a certain physiological measure, such as namely anxiety about losing, or be-
body temperature or blood pressure, is coming separated from, someone loved.
held between appropriate limits. In Why “mere separation” should cause
proposing the concept of a behavioral anxiety has been a mystery. Freud
system to account for the way a child or wrestled with the problem and advanced
older person maintains his relation to his a number of hypo these^.^^. 76 Every
attachment figure between certain limits other leading analyst has done the same.
of distance or accessibility, no more is With no means of evaluating them,
JOHN BOWLBY 671

many divergent schools of thought have inadequate theory of separation anxiety

proliferated. but to a failure to give proper weight to
The problem lies, I believe, in an un- the powerful effects, at all ages, of real
examined assumption, made not only by life events.
psychoanalysts but by more traditional Not only do threats of abandonment
psychiatrists as well, that fear is aroused create intense anxiety, they also arouse
in a mentally healthy person only in anger, often also of intense degree, es-
situations that everyone would perceive pecially in older children and adoles-
as intrinsically painful or dangerous, or cents. This anger, the function of which
that are perceived so by a person only is to dissuade the attachment figure from
because of his having become con- carrying out the threat, can easily be-
ditioned to them. Since fear of separa- come dysfunctional. It is in this light, I
tion and loss does not fit this formula, believe, that we can understand such
analysts have concluded that what is absurdly paradoxical behavior as the
feared is really some other situation; and adolescent, reported by B ~ r n h a m , ~ ’
a great variety of hypotheses have been who, having murdered his mother, ex-
advanced. claimed, “I couldn’t stand to have her
The difficulties disappear, however, leave me.”
when an ethological approach is Other pathogenic family situations
adopted. For it then becomes evident are readily understood in terms of at-
that man, like other animals, responds tachment theory. One fairly common
with fear to certain situations, not be- example is that of the child who has such
cause they carry a high risk of pain or a close relationship with his mother that
danger, but because they signal an in- he has difficulty in developing a social
crease of risk. Thus, just as animals of life outside the family, a relationship
many species, including man, are dis- sometimes described as symbiotic. In a
posed to respond with fear to sudden majority of such cases the cause of the
movement or a marked change in level trouble can be traced to the mother who,
of sound or light because to do so has having grown up anxiously attached as a
survival value, so are many species, in- result of a difficult childhood, is now
cluding man, disposed to respond to seeking to make her own child her at-
separation from a potentially caregiving tachment figure. Far from the child
figure and for the same reasons. being overindulged, as is sometimes as-
When separation anxiety is seen in serted, he is being burdened with having
this light, as a basic human disposition, to care for his own mother. Thus, in
it is only a small step to understanding these cases, the normal relationship of
why threats to abandon a child, often attached child to caregiving parent is
used as a means of control, are so very found to be inverted.
terrifying. Such threats, as well as
threats of suicide by a parent, are, we Mourning
now know, common causes of inten- Whilst separation anxiety is the usual
sified separation anxiety. Their extraor- response to a threat or some other risk of
dinary neglect in traditional clinical loss, mourning is the usual response to a
theory is due, I suspect, not only to an loss after it has occurred. During the
672 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

early years of psychoanalysis a number spond to loss of husband, I was struck

of analysts identified losses, occurring by the similarity of the responses he de-
during childhood or in later life, as scribed to those of young children. This
playing a causal role in emotional dis- led me to a systematic study of the lit-
turbance, especially in depressive dis- erature on mourning, especially the
orders; by 1950 a number of theories mourning of healthy adults. The se-
about the nature of mourning, and other quence of responses that commonly
responses to loss, had been advanced. occur, it became clear, was very dif-
Moreover, much sharp controversy had ferent from what clinical theorists had
already been engendered. This contro- been assuming. Not only does mourning
versy, which began during the 1930s, in mentally healthy adults last far longer
arose from the divergent theories about than the six months often suggested in
infant development that had been elabo- those days, but several component re-
rated in Vienna and London. Repre- sponses widely regarded as pathological
sentative examples of the different were found to be common in healthy
points of view about mourning are those mourning. These include anger, di-
expressed by DeutschZ9and by Klein.46 rected at third parties, the self, and
Whereas Deutsch held that, due to in- sometimes at the person lost; disbelief
adequate psychic development, chil- that the loss has occurred (misleadingly
dren are unable to mourn, Klein held termed denial); and a tendency, often
that they not only can mourn but do. In though not always unconscious, to
keeping with her strong emphasis on search for the lost person in the hope of
feeding, however, she held that the ob- reunion. The clearer the picture of
ject mourned was the lost breast; in mourning responses in adults became,
addition, she attributed a complex the clearer became their similarities to
fantasy-life to the infant. Opposite the responses observed in childhood.
though these theoretical positions are, This conclusion, when first ad-
both were constructed using the same vanced,I4*I 5 was much criticized; but
methodology, namely by inferences it has now been amply supported
about earlier phases of psychological by a number of subsequent stud-
development based on observations ies.33. 48. 58. 63
made during the analysis of older, Once an accurate picture of healthy
and emotionally disturbed, subjects. mourning has been obtained it becomes
Neither theory had been checked by di- possible to identify features that are
rect observation of how ordinary chil- truly indicative of pathology. It be-
dren of different ages respond to a loss. comes possible also to discern many of
Approaching the problem pros- the conditions that promote healthy
pectively, I was led to different conclu- mourning and those that lead in a
sions. During the early 1950s Robertson pathological direction. The belief that
and I had generalized the sequence of children are unable to mourn can then be
responses seen in young children during seen to derive from generalizations that
temporary separation from mother as had been made from the analyses of
those of protest, despair, and detach- children whose mourning had followed
~ n e n t . ~A’few years later, when reading an atypical course. In many cases this
a study by Marriss6 of how widows re- had been due either to the child never
JOHN BOWLBY 673

having been given adequate information much greater variety. Many draw on
about what had happened or else to such interrelated concepts as organiza-
there having been no one to sympathize tion, pattern, and information, while the
with him and help him gradually come to purposeful activities of biological or-
terms with his loss, his yearning for his ganisms can be conceived in terms of
lost parent, his anger and his sorrow. control systems structured in certain
ways. With supplies of physical energy
Defensive Processes available to them, these systems be-
The next step in this reformulation of come active on receipt of certain sorts of
theory was to consider how defensive signals and inactive on receipt of signals
processes could best be conceptualized, of other sorts. Thus the world of science
a crucial step since defensive processes in which we live is radically different
have always been at the heart of from the world Freud lived in at the turn
psychoanalytic theory. Although as a of the century, and the concepts avail-
clinician I have inevitably been con- able to us immeasurably better suited
cerned with the whole range of de- to our problems than were the very
fenses, as a research worker I have di- restricted ones available in his day.
rected my attention especially to the Returning now to the strange de-
way a young child behaves toward his tached behavior a young child shows
mother after a spell in a hospital or resi- after being away for a time with strange
dential nursery unvisited. In such cir- people in a strange place, what is so
cumstances it is common for a child to peculiar about it is, of course, the ab-
begin by treating his mother almost as sence of attachment behavior in circum-
though she were a stranger; then, after stances in which we would confidently
an interval, usually of hours or days, the expect to see it. Even when he has hurt
child becomes intensely clinging, anx- himself severely such a child shows no
ious lest he lose her again, and angry sign of seeking comfort. Thus, signals
with her should he think he may. In that would ordinarily activate attach-
some way all his feeling for his mother ment behavior are failing to do so. This
and all the behavior toward her we take suggests that, in some way and for some
for granted (keeping within range of her reason, these signals are failing to reach
and, most notably, turning to her when the behavioral system responsible for
frightened or hurt) has suddenly attachment behavior, that they are being
vanished-nly to reappear again after blocked off and the behavioral system
an interval. That was the condition itself thereby immobilized. What this
Robertson and I termed detachment, means is that a system controlling such
and that we believed was a result of crucial behavior as attachment can in
some defensive process operating certain circumstances be rendered
within the child. either temporarily or permanently inca-
Whereas Freud in his scientific pable of being activated, and the whole
theorizing felt confined to a conceptual range of feeling and desire that normally
model that explained all phenomena, accompanies it can thus be rendered in-
whether physical or biological, in terms capable of being aroused.
of the disposition of energy, today we In considering how this deactivation
have available conceptual models of might be effected, I turn to the work of
674 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

the cognitive psychologist^^^^ 3 1 , 5 7 who, form of defense, so I see the role of

during the past 20 years, have revo- defensive exclusion.* A fuller account
lutionized our understanding of how we of this, an information processing ap-
perceive the world and how we construe proach to the problem of defense, in
the situations we are in. Amongst much which defenses are classified into defen-
else that is clinically congenial, this rev- sive processes, defensive beliefs, and
olution in cognitive theory not only defensive activities, is given in an early
gives unconscious mental processes the chapter of Loss.I9
central place in mental life that analysts
have always claimed for them, but pre-
sents a picture of the mental apparatus An Alternative Frumework
as well able to shut off information of During the period in which the
certain specified types and of doing so conceptual framework described here
selectively without the person being was developed, Margaret Mahler has
aware of what is happening. been concerned with many of the same
In the emotionally detached children clinical problems and some of the same
described earlier-and also, I believe, in features of children's behavior; she also
adults who have developed the kind of has been developing a revised concep-
personality that Winnicott7' described tual framework to account for them, set
as "false self' and K o h ~ t as ~ ~ out fully in The Psychological Birth of
"narcissistic"-the information being the Human Infant. s4 To compare alter-
blocked off is of a very special type. Far native frameworks is never easy, as
from its being the routine exclusion of KuhnSoemphasized, and no attempt is
irrelevant and potentially distracting made to do so here. Elsewhere*' I have
information that we engage in all the described what I believe to be some of
time and that is readily reversible, what the strengths of the framework I favor,
is being excluded in these pathological including its close relatedness to empiri-
conditions are the signals, arising from cal data, both clinical and devel-
both inside and outside the person, that opmental, and its compatibility with
would activate their attachment behav- current ideas in evolutionary biology
ior and that would enable them both to and neurophysiology; the shortcomings
love and to experience being loved. In of Mahler's framework have been tren-
other words, the mental structures re- chantly criticized by Peterfreund60and
sponsiblefor routine selective exclusion K l e i ~ ~ In . ~ 'brief, Mahler's theories of
are being employed (one might say normal development, including her
exploited) for a special and potentially postulated normal phases of autism and
pathological purpose. This form of ex- symbiosis, are shown to rest not on ob-
clusion I refer to, for obvious reasons, as servation but on preconceptions based
defensive exclusion, which is, of on traditional psychoanalytic theory
course, only another way of describing and, in doing so, to ignore almost en-
repression. And, just as Freud regarded tirely the remarkable body of new in-
repression as the key process in every formation about early infancy that has

*As Spiegel'O has pointed out, my term "defensive exclusion" carries a meaning very similar to
Sullivan's term "selective inattention."
JOHN BOWLBY 675

been built up from careful empirical . . . people brought up in unhappy or disrupted

studies over the past two decades. Al- homes are more likely to have illegitimate chil-
though some of the clinical implications dren, to become teenage mothers, to make un-
happy marriages, and to divorce.6*
of Mahler’s theory are not very different
from those of attachment theory, and Thus, adverse childhood experiences
her concept of return to base to “refuel” have effects of at least two kinds. First,
is similar to that of use of attachment they make the individual more vulnera-
figure as secure base from which to ex- ble to later adverse experiences. Sec-
plore, the key concepts with which the ondly, they make it more likely that he
two frameworks are built are very dif- or she will meet with further such expe-
ferent. riences. Whereas the earlier adverse
experiences are likely to be wholly in-
dependent of the agency of the individ-
RESEARCH ual concerned, the later ones are likely
Nothing has been so rewarding as the to be the consequences of his or her own
immense amount of careful research to actions, actions that spring from those
which the early work on maternal depri- disturbances of personality to which the
vation has given rise. The literature is earlier experiences have given rise.
now enormous and far beyond the com- Of the many types of psychological
pass of an account of this sort to sum- disturbance that are traceable, at least in
marize. Fortunately, moreover, it is un- part, to one or another pattern of mater-
necessary since a new, comprehensive, nal deprivation, the effects on parental
and critical review of the field has re- behavior and thereby on the next gener-
cently been published by Rutter,68who ation are potentially the most serious.
concluded by referring to the “continu- Thus a mother who, due to adverse ex-
ing accumulation of evidence showing periences during childhood, grows up to
the importance of deprivation and dis- be anxiously attached is prone to seek
advantage on children’s psychological care from her own child and thereby
development” and expressing the view lead the child to become anxious, guilty,
that the original arguments “have been and perhaps phobic.” A mother who as
amply confirmed.” A principal finding a child suffered neglect and frequent
of recent work is the extent to which two severe threats of being abandoned or
or more adverse experiences interact so beaten is more prone than others to
that the risk of a psychological distur- abuse her child physically,2*resulting in
bance following is multiplied, often the adverse effects on the child‘s devel-
many times over. An example of this oping personality recorded by, amongst
interactive effect of adverse experi- others, George and Main.34Systematic
ences is seen in the findings of Brown research into the effects of childhood
and Harris,14 derived from their studies experiences on the way mothers and
of depressive disorders in women. fathers treat their children has only just
Not only is there this strongly inter- begun and seems likely to be one of the
active effect of adverse experiences, most fruitful of all fields for further re-
there is also an increased likelihood for search. Other research leads are de-
someone who has had one adverse ex- scribed in a recent symposium edited by
perience to have another. For example, Parkes and Stevenson- Hinde . 5 9
676 ATTACHMENT AND LOSS

CONCLUSION 5. A I N S W O R T H . M . 1 9 8 2 . Attachment: retrospect

and prospect. It1 The Place of Attachment in
My reason for giving so much space in Human Behavior, C. Parkes and J.
this account to the development of Stevenson-Hinde, eds. Basic Books. New
theory is not only because it has occu- York.
6. AINSWORTH, M. ET A L . 1978. Patterns of At-
pied so much of my time but because, as tachment: Assessed in the Strange Situation
Kurt Lewin remarked long ago, “There and at Home. Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale,
is nothing so practical as a good theory,” N.J.
7. AINSWORTH, M . A N D WITTIG, B . 1969. At-
and, of course, nothing so handicapping tachment and exploratory behavior of one-
as a poor one. Without good theory as a year-olds in a strange situation. In Determi-
guide, research is likely to be difficult to nants of Infant Behavior. Vol. 4. B. Foss. ed.
Barnes & Noble. New York.
plan and to be unproductive, and find- 8. B E N I I E R , L . 1947. Psychopathic behavior dis-
ings are difficult to interpret. With- orders in children. In Handbook of Correc-
out a reasonably valid theory of tional Psychology, R. Lindner and R.
Seliger, eds. Philosophical Library, New
psychopathology, therapeutic tech- York.
niques tend to be blunt and of uncertain 9. B E N D E R . L . . and YARNEI.1.. H . 1941. An obser-
benefit. Without a reasonably valid vation nursery. Amer. J . Psychiat. 9 7 : 1 1 5 8 -
1174.
theory of etiology, systematic and 10. B O W L B Y . J . 1940. The influence of early envi-
agreed measures of prevention will ronment in the development of neurosis and
never be supported. My hope is that, in neurotic character. Inter. J. Psychoanal.
21:154-178.
the long term, the greatest value of the 11. B O W L B Y , J . 1944. Forty-four juvenile thieves:
theory proposed may prove to be the their characters and home life. Inter. J. Psy-
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likely to promote healthy personality Health. Columbia University Press, New
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3 . B O W I B Y , J . 1958. The nature of the child’s tie
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know what is best for their children and 373.
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provide it. fancy and early childhood. Psychoanal. Study
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15. BOWLBY. J . 1961. Processes of mourning.
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For reprints: Dr.John Bowlby, Tavistock Clinic, 120 Belsize Lane, London NW 3