Jane Buekett
Bowlby’s attachment theory has had a lot of bad press over the years (it’s sexist, it’s inaccurate and alarmist, etc). However, before we are too harsh about it, it is worth looking at what it sought to replace.
In the late 1920s, John Watson, an uncritical worshipper of behaviourism, published The Psychological Care of Infant and Child (Watson 1928). He argued that raising a child should be essentially the same as training a lab rat. Observe the following heart-warming quotation from the book, describing the proper way to raise children:
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