Leo is 8 years old. His teachers have raised concerns about his behaviour at school; he frequently displays aggressive outbursts towards his peers and shows a striking lack of empathy or remorse when he hurts others. Furthermore, he appears emotionally detached, struggles to form close friendships, and seems indifferent to praise or correction from school staff.
When Leo was 18 months old, his father (who was his primary caregiver) was hospitalised for a period of three months following a serious accident. During this time, Leo was cared for across four different temporary foster placements. Following his father’s recovery, Leo was enrolled in a large local day-care centre for 50 hours a week, which suffered from chronic understaffing and a high turnover of temporary workers, meaning Leo never had a consistent key worker.
Discuss how Leo’s early care experiences may have affected his psychological development and current behaviour, with reference to Bowlby's work on attachment.
You must make reference to the context in your answer.
Practise Edexcel A Level Psychology Content with exam-style questions for A Level Psychology. 1,059 questions covering Bowlby's work on attachment, Ainsworth and the Strange Situation, Research into deprivation, Research into privation, Research into day care, Cross-cultural research into attachment, Autism, Individual differences, and Developmental psychology, matched to the Edexcel A Level Psychology (9PS0) specification and written in Paper 1, Paper 2 and Paper 3 style. Every question includes a full worked solution and mark scheme, so you can see where marks are awarded rather than just whether you got the answer right.
