Describing and evaluating research on deprivationDeprivation is the absence of any attachment, it has more serious consequences than deprivation.Hodges and Tizard conducted research on deprivation.They followed the development of 65 children who had been living in residential daycare centers since they were a few months old. This was a longitudinal study as they were followed until they were 16 years old. The children were compared to a control group who had always lived with their family; they were closely matched to the experimental group. The care provided to the children was good but caregivers were discouraged from forming attachments, so these were cases of deprivation. By age 4, 23 children had been adopted, 11 had been restored (returned to their original homes), and the remainder remained in institutions. Children were interviewed at ages 4, 8 and 16. In addition, their mothers were interviewed, the children were given self-report questionnaires on “social difficulties”, the children were given a psychometric test, and their teachers were given questionnaires on “social difficulties”. children's relationships with peers and teachers. Hodges and Tizard found that by age 8, adopted children had formed good attachments and had better social and intellectual development than those who had been restored. They also found that the restored children had weaker attachments and more behavioral problems. They found that all of the children were more attention-seeking, had difficulty with social relationships, had problems with their siblings, and had poorer relationships with their peers. They therefore concluded that children who had been deprived of attachments in their previous life can establish good attachments later in life, although this depends on...... middle of paper ...... age 6 months and 2 years old and those who were adopted after the age of 2 years. He found that by age 6, children recovered well, but those who were adopted after age 2 had higher levels of weaker attachments to those around them. He then observed them again when they were 11 and found that some had recovered, but those who had had attachment issues at age 6 still suffered from them. One of the positives of this research is the sample size, as there are 111 children involved in the study, the results are more likely to be generalizable as it is likely that the group is quite diverse. However, a problem with this research is that babies who were adopted before 6 months of age may not have experienced deprivation as they would still be quite young and would be able to form a significant attachment with someone.