monkey

Harry F. Harlow, “Love in Infant Monkeys,” 1959 : 

Harry F. Harlow, “Love in Infant Monkeys,” 1959 An instinct Incapable of Analysis Elizabeth Anderson, Garrett Mehrguth, Kailey Hopkins

Experiment Location : 

Experiment Location Primate Laboratory of the University of Wisconsin

Research Questions : 

Research Questions Is nursing and all associated activities with that of simple bodily contact related to the infant monkey’s attachment to its mother? Would they also seek the inanimate mother for comfort and security when they were subjected to emotional stress?

Experiment Procedure : 

Experiment Procedure Two surrogate mother monkeys were used. One is a bare welded-wire cylindrical form surmounted by a wooden head with a crude face. In the other the welded wire is cushioned by a sheathing of terry cloth. Eight newborn monkeys were placed in individual cages, each with equal access to a cloth and a wire mother.

Experiment Procedure cont… : 

Experiment Procedure cont… Four of the infants received their milk from one mother and four from the other. . . . The monkeys in the two groups drank the same amount of milk and gained weight at the same rate.

Experiment 2 : 

Experiment 2 They were then presented with a mechanical teddy bear which moved forward, beating a drum. Whether the infants had nursed from the wire or the cloth mother, they overwhelmingly sought comfort from the cloth one.

Experiment #3 : 

Experiment #3 The infant monkeys were deprived of contact even from the cloth monkeys for the first eight months of their lives. When introduced to other terry cloth monkey they showed no interest or need for protection. Even when they were introduced to other monkeys they could not form attachments. The long period of maternal deprivation had evidently left them incapable of forming a lasting affectional tie. . . .

Results : 

Results Records showed that both of the first groups of infants spent far more time clinging on their cloth-covered mothers than they did on their wire mothers. These results prove the importance—of bodily contact and the immediate comfort it supplies in forming the infant’s attachment for its mother. The long period of maternal deprivation had evidently left them incapable of forming a lasting affectional tie. . . .

Graphs : 

Graphs

Graphs : 

Graphs

Source : 

Source Harry F. Harlow, “Love in Infant Monkeys,” Scientific American 200 (June 1959):68, 70, 72-73, 74.