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HARRY F. HARLOW
University oj Wisconsin
Love is a wondrous state, deep, tender, and re- clear: The initial love responses of the human be-
warding. Because of its intimate and personal na- ing are those made by the infant to the mother or
ture it is regarded by some as an improper topic some mother surrogate. From this intimate attach-
for experimental research. But, whatever our per- ment of the child to the mother, multiple learned
sonal feelings may be, our assigned mission as psy- and generalized affectional responses are formed.
chologists is to analyze all facets of human and Unfortunately, beyond these simple facts we
animal behavior into their component variables. know little about the fundamental variables under-
So far as love or affection is concerned, psycholo- lying the formation of affectional responses and
gists have failed in this mission. The little we little about the mechanisms through which the love
know about love does not transcend simple obser- of the infant for the mother develops into the
vation, and the little we write about it has been multifaceted response patterns characterizing love
written better by poets and novelists. But of or affection in the adult. Because of the dearth of
greater concern is the fact that psychologists tend experimentation, theories about the fundamental
to give progressively less attention to a motive nature of affection have evolved at the level of
which pervades our entire lives. Psychologists, at observation, intuition, and discerning guesswork,
least psychologists who write textbooks, not only whether these have been proposed by psycholo-
show no interest in the origin and development of gists, sociologists, anthropologists, physicians, or
love or affection, but they seem to be unaware of psychoanalysts.
its very existence. The position commonly held by psychologists
The apparent repression of love by modern psy- and sociologists is quite clear: The basic motives
chologists stands in sharp contrast with the atti- are, for the most part, the primary drives—particu-
tude taken by many famous and normal people. larly hunger, thirst, elimination, pain, and sex—
The word "love" has the highest reference fre- and all other motives, including love or affec-
quency of any word cited in Bartlett's book of tion, are derived or secondary drives. The mother
Familiar Quotations. It would appear that this is associated with the reduction of the primary
emotion has long had a vast interest and fascina- drives—particularly hunger, thirst, and pain—and
tion for human beings, regardless of the attitude through learning, affection or love is derived.
taken by psychologists; but the quotations cited, It is entirely reasonable to believe that the
even by famous and normal people, have a mun- mother through association with food may become
dane redundancy. These authors and authorities a secondary-reinforcing agent, but this is an in-
have stolen love from the child and infant and adequate mechanism to account for the persistence
made it the exclusive property of the adolescent of the infant-maternal ties. There is a spate of re-
and adult. searches on the formation of secondary reinforcers
Thoughtful men, and probably all women, have to hunger and thirst reduction. There can be no
speculated on the nature of love. From the de- question that almost any external stimulus can be-
velopmental point of view, the general plan is quite come a secondary reinforcer if properly associated
1 with tissue-need reduction, but the fact remains
Address of the President at the sixty-sixth Annual Con-
vention of the American Psychological Association, Wash- that this redundant literature demonstrates un-
ington, D, C., August 31, 1958. equivocally that such derived drives suffer rela-
The researches reported in this paper were supported by tively rapid experimental extinction. Contrariwise,
funds supplied by Grant No. M-722, National Institutes of human affection does not extinguish when the
Health, by a grant from the Ford Foundation, and by
funds received from the Graduate School of the Univer- mother ceases to have intimate association with
sity of Wisconsin. the drives in question. Instead, the affectional
673
674 THE AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGIST
cloth mother surrogate other than in the quality >- 1? • • CLOTH MOTHER
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of the contact comfort which she can supply. Q
6-
0-— -OWIRE MOTHER
-
—From Look, August 19, 1958 From All About Snakes, E. M. Hale & Co.
The Hippopotamus The Snake
This is the skin some babies feel To baby vipers, scaly skin
Replete with hippo love appeal. Engenders love 'twixt kith and kin.
Each contact, cuddle, push, and shove Each animal by God is blessed
Elicits tons of baby love. With kind of skin it loves the best.
678 THE AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGIST
-Ylla
The Elephant
Though mother may be short on arms,
Her skin is full of warmth and charms.
And mother's touch on baby's skin You see, all God's chillun's got skin.
Endears the heart that beats within.
One function of the real mother, human or sub-
human, and presumably of a mother surrogate, is
to provide a haven of safety for the infant in times
of fear and danger. The frightened or ailing child
clings to its mother, not its father; and this selec-
tive responsiveness in times of distress, disturbance,
or danger may be used as a measure of the strength
of affectional bonds. We have tested this kind of
differential responsiveness by presenting to the in-
fants in their cages, in the presence of the two
mothers, various fear-producing stimuli such as the
moving toy bear illustrated in Figure 13. A typi-
cal response to a fear stimulus is shown in Figure
14, and the data on differential responsiveness are
presented in Figure IS. It is apparent that the
cloth mother is highly preferred over the wire one,
—Sponholz and this differential selectivity is enhanced by age
and experience. In this situation, the variable of
The Crocodile nursing appears to be of absolutely no importance:
Here is the skin they love to touch. the infant consistently seeks the soft mother surro-
It isn't soft and there isn't much, gate regardless of nursing condition.
But its contact comfort will beguile Similarly, the mother or mother surrogate pro-
Love from the infant crocodile. vides its young with a source of security, and this
THE NATURE OF LOVE
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MEAN DAY OF AGE
FIG. 13. Typical fear stimulus. FIG. 15. Differential responsiveness in fear tests.
680 THE AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGIST
•••IRSIISSgS' •^B^"iS*-r;w'::s';;i;?iHvSiS;5|f|piS^^^M
FlS. 16. Response to cloth mother in the open-field test. FIG. 18. Response in the open-field test in the absence of
the mother surrogate.
center of the room where the mother was custom-
arily placed and then run rapidly from object to mature monkeys enclosed in a dimly lighted box
object, screaming and crying all the while. Con- would open and reopen a door hour after hour for
tinuous, frantic clutching of their bodies was very no other reward than that of looking outside the
common, even when not in the crouching position. box. We now have data indicating that neonatal
These monkeys frequently contacted and clutched monkeys show this same compulsive visual curi-
the cloth diaper, but this action never pacified osity on their first test day in an adaptation of the
them. The same behavior occurred in the pres- Butler apparatus which we call the "love machine,"
ence of the wire mother. No difference between an apparatus designed to measure love. Usually
the cloth-mother-fed and wire-mother-fed infants these tests are begun when the monkey is 10 days
was demonstrated under either condition. Four of age, but this same persistent visual exploration
control infants never raised with a mother surro- has been obtained in a three-day-old monkey dur-
gate showed the same emotionality scores when ing the first half-hour of testing. Butler also dem-
the mother was absent as the experimental infants onstrated that rhesus monkeys show selectivity in
showed in the absence of the mother, but the con- rate and frequency of door-opening to stimuli of
trols' scores were slightly larger in the presence of differential attractiveness in the visual field out-
the mother surrogate than in her absence. side the box. We have utilized this principle of
Some years ago Robert Butler demonstrated that
E MOTHER
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682 THE AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGIST
ent upon the results obtained. It would appear these infants spent on the mother surrogates.
that affectional responses may show as much re- Within 10 days mean contact time is approxi-
sistance to extinction as has been previously dem- mately nine hours, and this measure remains rela-
onstrated for learned fears and learned pain, and tively constant throughout the next 30 days. Con-
such data would be in keeping with those of com- sistent with the results on the subjects reared from
mon human observation. birth with dual mothers, these late-adopted in-
The infant's responses to the mother surrogate fants spent less than one and one-half hours per
in the fear tests, the open-field situation, and the day in contact with the wire mothers, and this ac-
baby Butler box and the responses on the retention tivity level was relatively constant throughout the
tests cannot be described adequately with words. test sessions. Although the maximum time that the
For supplementary information we turn to the mo- control monkeys spent on the cloth mother was
tion picture record. (At this point a 20-minute only about half that spent by the original dual
film was presented illustrating and supplementing mother-surrogate group, we cannot be sure that
the behaviors described thus far in the address.) this discrepancy is a function of differential early
We have already described the group of four con- experience. The control monkeys were about three
trol infants that had never lived in the presence of months older when the mothers were attached to
any mother surrogate and had demonstrated no their cages than the experimental animals had been
sign of affection or security in the presence of the when their mothers were removed and the reten-
cloth mothers introduced in test sessions. When tion tests begun. Thus, we do not know what the
these infants reached the age of 250 days, cubicles amount of contact would be for a 250-day-old ani-
containing both a cloth mother and a wire mother mal raised from birth with surrogate mothers.
were attached to their cages. There was no lacta- Nevertheless, the magnitude of the differences and
tion in these mothers, for the monkeys were on a the fact that the contact-time curves for the moth-
solid-food diet. The initial reaction of the mon- ered-from-birth infants had remained constant for
keys to the alterations was one of extreme disturb- almost 150 days suggest that early experience with
ance. All the infants screamed violently and made the mother is a variable of measurable importance.
repeated attempts to escape the cage whenever the The control group has also been tested for dif-
door was opened. They kept a maximum distance ferential visual exploration after the introduction
from the mother surrogates and exhibited a consid- of the cloth and wire mothers; these behaviors are
erable amount of rocking and crouching behavior, plotted in Figure 26. By the second test session
indicative of emotionality. Our first thought was a high level of exploratory behavior had developed,
that the critical period for the development of and the responsiveness to the wire mother and the
maternally directed affection had passed and that empty box is significantly greater than that to the
these macaque children were doomed to live as cloth mother. This is probably not an artifact
affectional orphans. Fortunately, these behaviors
continued for only 12 to 48 hours and then gradu-
ally ebbed, changing from indifference to active
contact on, and exploration of, the surrogates. The
home-cage behavior of these control monkeys
slowly became similar to that of the animals raised
with the mother surrogates from birth. Their ma- (CLOTH MOTHER
nipulation and play on the cloth mother became 0—OWIRE MOTHER
progressively more vigorous to the point of actual
mutilation, particularly during the morning after z
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the cloth mother had been given her daily change LlJ
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WIRE MOTHER
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tioned. There is every reason to believe, however,
CLOTH MOTHER
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WIRE MOTHER
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that this interval of delay depresses the intensity
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- of the affectional response below that of the infant
BLANK
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£ 20 monkeys that were surrogate-mothered from birth
10 onward. In interpreting these data it is well to
remember that the control monkeys had had con-
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250-258 270-278 290-298 310-318
DAYS OF AGE
tinuous opportunity to observe and hear other
FIG. 26. Differential visual exploration of monkeys started
monkeys housed in adjacent cages and that they
at 250 days of age. had had limited opportunity to view and contact
surrogate mothers in the test situations, even
since there is every reason to believe that the face though they did not exploit the opportunities.
of the cloth mother is a fear stimulus to most mon- During the last two years we have observed the
keys that have not had extensive experience with behavior of two infants raised by their own moth-
this object during the first 40 to 60 days of life. ers. Love for the real mother and love for the
Within the third test session a sharp change in surrogate mother appear to be very similar. The
trend occurs, and the cloth mother is then more baby macaque spends many hours a day clinging
frequently viewed than the wire mother or the to its real mother. If away from the mother when
blank box; this trend continues during the fourth frightened, it rushes to her and in her presence
session, producing a significant preference for the shows comfort and composure. As far as we can
cloth mother. observe, the infant monkey's affection for the real
Before the introduction of the mother surrogate mother is strong, but no stronger than that of
into the home-cage situation, only one of the four the experimental monkey for the surrogate cloth
control monkeys had ever contacted the cloth mother, and the security that the infant gains
mother in the open-field tests. In general, the from the presence of the real mother is no greater
surrogate mother not only gave the infants no se- than the security it gains from a cloth surrogate.
curity, but instead appeared to serve as a fear Next year we hope to put this problem to final,
stimulus. The emotionality scores of these con- definitive, experimental test. But, whether the
trol subjects were slightly higher during the mother- mother is real or a cloth surrogate, there does de-
present test sessions than during the mother-absent velop a deep and abiding bond between mother
test sessions. These behaviors were changed radi- and child. In one case it may be the call of the
cally by the fourth post-introduction test approxi- wild and in the other the McCall of civilization,
mately 60 days later. In the absence of the cloth but in both cases there is "togetherness."
mothers the emotionality index in this fourth test In spite of the importance of contact comfort,
remains near the earlier level, but the score is re- there is reason to believe that other variables of
duced by half when the mother is present, a result measurable importance will be discovered. Pos-
strikingly similar to that found for infants raised tural support may be such a variable, and it has
with the dual mother-surrogates from birth. The been suggested that, when we build arms into the
control infants now show increasing object explora- mother surrogate, 10 is the minimal number re-
tion and play behavior, and they begin to use the quired to provide adequate child care. Rocking
mother as a base of operations, as did the infants motion may be such a variable, and we are com-
raised from birth with the mother surrogates. paring rocking and stationary mother surrogates
However, there are still definite differences in the and inclined planes. The differential responsive-
behavior of the two groups. The control infants ness to cloth mother and cloth-covered inclined
do not rush directly to the mother and clutch her plane suggests that clinging as well as contact is
violently; but instead they go toward, and orient an affectional variable of importance. Sounds,
THE NATURE OF LOVE 68S
particularly natural, maternal sounds, may operate Although we have made no attempts thus far to
as either unlearned or learned affectional variables. study the generalization of infant-macaque affec-
Visual responsiveness may be such a variable, and tion or love, the techniques which we have devel-
it is possible that some semblance of visual im- oped offer promise in this uncharted field. Beyond
printing may develop in the neonatal monkey. this, there are few if any technical difficulties in
There are indications that this becomes a variable studying the affection of the actual, living mother
of importance during the course of infancy through for the child, and the techniques developed can be
some maturational process, utilized and expanded for the analysis and develop-
John Bowlby has suggested that there is an af- mental study of father-infant and infant-infant af-
fectional variable which he calls "primary object fection.
following," characterized by visual and oral search Since we can measure neonatal and infant affec-
of the mother's face. Our surrogate-mother-raised tional responses to mother surrogates, and since we
baby monkeys are at first inattentive to her face, know they are strong and persisting, we are in a
as are human neonates to human mother faces. position to assess the effects of feeding and con-
But by 30 days of age ever-increasing responsive- tactual schedules; consistency and inconsistency in
ness to the mother's face appears—whether through the mother surrogates; and early, intermediate, and
learning, maturation, or both—and we have reason late maternal deprivation. Again, we have here a
to believe that the face becomes an object of spe- family of problems of fundamental interest and
cial attention. theoretical importance.
Our first surrogate-mother-raised baby had a If the researches completed and proposed make
mother whose head was just a ball of wood since a contribution, I shall be grateful; but I have also
the baby was a month early and we had not had given full thought to possible practical applications.
time to design a more esthetic head and face. This The socioeconomic demands of the present and the
baby had contact with the blank-faced mother for threatened socioeconomic demands of the future
180 days and was then placed with two cloth moth- have led the American woman to displace, or
ers, one motionless and one rocking, both being en- threaten to displace, the American man in science
dowed with painted, ornamented faces. To our and industry. If this process continues, the prob-
surprise the animal would compulsively rotate both lem of proper child-rearing practices faces us with
faces 180 degrees so that it viewed only a round, startling clarity. It is cheering in view of this
smooth face and never the painted, ornamented trend to realize that the American male is physi-
face. Furthermore, it would do this as long as the cally endowed with all the really essential equip-
patience of the experimenter in reorienting the ment to compete with the American female on
faces persisted. The monkey showed no sign of equal terms in one essential activity: the rearing
fear or anxiety, but it showed unlimited persist- of infants. We now know that women in the work-
ence. Subsequently it improved its technique, com- ing classes are not needed in the home because of
pulsively removing the heads and rolling them into their primary mammalian capabilities; and it is
its cage as fast as they were returned. We are in- possible that in the foreseeable future neonatal
trigued by this observation, and we plan to ex- nursing will not be regarded as a necessity, but as
amine systematically the role of the mother face a luxury—to use Veblen's term—a form of con-
in the development of infant-monkey affections. spicuous consumption limited perhaps to the upper
Indeed, these observations suggest the need for a classes. But whatever course history may take, it
series of ethological-type researches on the two- is comforting to know that we are now in contact
faced female. with the nature of love.