ABSTRACT
Given the negative developmental consequences observed in classic research on the effects of early social deprivation (Bowlby, 1951, 1969; Spitz, 1950, 1965), most developmental psychologists readily accept the view that humans, like other altricial species, require the social input of adult caregivers for adaptive development. Over the past several decades, research concerned with early social stimulation has gradually shifted from a focus on the effects of social deprivation per se, to questions concerned with the influence of qualitative differences in our early social experiences. Indeed, much of the contemporary literature shares a pervasive assumption that various qualitative properties of social stimulation are optimal for adaptive development above and beyond the quantity of stimulation experienced.
