The term
maternal deprivation is a catch-phrase summarising the early work of
psychiatrist and
psychoanalyst,
John Bowlby on the effects of separating infants and young children from their mother (or mother substitute) although the effect of loss of the mother on the developing child had been considered earlier by
Freud and other theorists. Bowlby's work on delinquent and affectionless children and the effects of hospital and institutional care lead to his being commissioned to write the
World Health Organisation's report on the mental health of homeless children in post-war Europe whilst he was head of the Department for Children and Parents at the
Tavistock Clinic in London after
World War II. The result was the monograph
Maternal Care and Mental Health published in 1951, which sets out the maternal deprivation hypothesis.