Attachment and Health
John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth developed attachment theory in the 1960s while investigating the effects of maternal separation on infant development. The development of the Strange Situation task in 1965 by Ainsworth and Wittig allowed researchers to systematically investigate the attachment system operating between children and their parents. The Strange Situation involves separating infant-parent dyads and observing infant behaviours upon reunion. Infant behaviour tended to follow patterns, leading to the development of three attachment categories: Secure, Anxious-Avoidant, and Anxious-Resistant. In 1990, Ainsworth added a new category, championed by Mary Main, called Disorganized/Disoriented attachment, characterized by its less reliable pattern of behaviour.
Herman Witkin
Herman A. Witkin (2 August 1916 – 8 July 1979) was an American psychologist who specialized in the spheres of cognitive psychology and learning psychology. He was a pioneer of the theory of cognitive styles and learning styles (developed in cooperation with Solomon Asch, Donald Goodenough etc.). He preferred to diagnose not by questionnaires but by other means, such as projective tests, task-solving tests etc. He was the author of the concept of field-dependency vs. field-independency. The majority of Witkin's research was done during his tenures at the SUNY Downstate Medical Center College of Medicine in Brooklyn, NY and at Educational Testing Service (ETS) in Princeton, New Jersey, where he worked until his death in 1979. A "Review of General Psychology" survey, published in 2002, ranked Witkin as the 96th most cited psychologist of the 20th century.