SIR RICHARD BOWLBY

Honorary Research Fellow, Attachment Research Unit, Dept. of Psychology, University College London,

2000 - 2003.

Sir Richard Bowlby became interested in the field of developmental psychology after thirty years working as a scientific photographer in some of the UK’s leading medical research centers. He has spent many years studying the work of his father Dr. John Bowlby, and now incorporates the current research findings on attachment theory into his presentations about children’s early relationships.

“I had not come across infant massage in my studies about child development until I was invited to a conference organised by International Association of Infant Massage (lAIM) in 2002. I soon realised that this particular form of infant massage and the Positive Touch work Cherry Bond is promoting, was based on my father’s work, and that it recognised the crucial importance of the early attachment relationship between baby and mother (or primary carer), and that I needed to investigate infant massage in greater detail. After some time studying the theory and practice carefully, and filming a Certified Infant Massage Instructor (CIMI) teaching a class how to massage babies, I am now routinely including a description and video clips of it in my lectures.

I consider that Positive Touch and infant massage is a beautiful example of how maternal sensitivity can be enhanced at precisely the age when a baby’s attachment bond is developing, and how much a mother and baby can benefit from the experience of loving touch”.

Dr John Bowlby (1907-1990)

“The truth is that the least-studied phase of human development remains the phase during which a child is acquiring all that makes him most distinctly human.
Here is still a continent to conquer”