Joyce Robertson

Joyce Robertson (27 March 1919 – 12 April 2013) was a British psychiatric social worker, child behavioural researcher, childcare pioneer and pacifist, who was most notable for changing attitudes to the societally acceptable, institutionalised care and hospitalisation of young children, that was prevalent.

Robertson left Grammar school in 1933 when she was 14 and enrolled for evening classes at the Workers' Educational Association.

In 1939, Joyce met her future husband James Robertson in Birmingham while he was studying the humanities at the Fircroft College of Adult Education and she was studying at the Hillcroft College for working women.

In the late 1940s Robertson worked with Anna Freud first at the Well Baby Clinic and later in the Hampstead Child Therapy Clinic.

She was later joined by her husband James Robertson.

During World War II, Joyce and James were conscientious objectors, and during the late 1940's both worked at the Pacifist Service Unit in East London with the victims of the bombing.

In January 1941, while she was a student, Robertson went to work with Anna Freud and Dorothy Burlingham in Hampstead to look after infants.

At the time, Freud and Burlingham were offering shelter to women with families who had been bombed.

Knowing that Robertson came from a large family, and as she was the only Briton in the war nurseries, Freud employed her and asked her to research the different methods of childcare, determine what types of practice were in use and write detailed observations on index cards.

A few weeks later, James Robertson was employed by Freud as a boilerman, fire watcher and handyman.

At that time, James Robertson was courting Joyce Robertson and it was through her that James met Freud.

Freud asked Robertson to care for a baby named Josef, observing Robertson in the mother-child relationship and then discussing the care relationship with her.

Freud found that Robertson's hearty nature enabled her to connect with the small baby who responded to the care.

Freud then asked Robertson to care for a little boy who was five months old.

Over months, Robertson formed a strong attachment to the boy and would take him on walks.

These observations of the mother-child relationship and resultant discussions was the start of attachment research that would eventually lead to Attachment theory.

Robertson remembered kneeling on the floor with Freud while they reviewed the observation notes that would form the basis of a publication by Robertson and her husband entitled "Reactions of small children to short-term separation of the mother, in light of new observations".

Joyce had two daughters, Katherine McGilly (born in1944) and Jean Clelland (born in 1950).

She had two grandchildren and three great grandchildren.

Robertson took time off for the birth of her first daughter in 1944.

In 1948, her husband James Robertson joined the Tavistock Clinic to make observations of the behaviour of small children.

In the early 1950s she had to take her baby into hospital for treatment.

She was devastated to discover she was not able to visit her child, although she knew that the baby needed her.

At that time, the rule was no mothers, with hospital visits commonly limited to 30 minutes per week.

This experience sparked Robertson's interest in the field of childcare.

In 1952, her husband James made the film A Two-Year-Old Goes to Hospital and published a paper with John Bowlby.

Robertson and Bowlby were planning to abandon the documentary since the child being studied (Laura) did not cry very much.

She had been in hospital for eight days, admitted for a hernia operation.

In the film the mother is seen leaving the child, assured by the nurse that she would settle down when she leaves.

She didn't return to work with Freud until 1957, when her second daughter started primary school.

She worked initially in the Well Baby Clinic.

At the clinic, she started the first parent-toddler group.

Joyce understood that the parents would need help in understanding their infant's new development stage, once they moved out of the clinic.

Later she moved to the kindergarten of the Hampstead Child Therapy Clinic.

In 1965, both of them moved to the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations to work with John Bowlby on the Young Children in Brief Separation project and the development of attachment theory.

This was to research the mental state and psychological development of children who underwent brief separation from their parents.

Later in her career, Robertson worked with her husband to produce a series of celebrated documentary films that highlighted the reaction of small children who were separated from their parents.

These were shown in hospitals, foster care and state run hospitals.

Later she was known for promoting the idea of foster care instead of residential nurseries.

Robertson (nee User) came from a large working-class family in London.