During pregnancy, birth and beyond, if not interfered
with, nature locks the mother and baby's biorhythms, heart
frequencies, hormonal balances, sleep patterns and a thousand
other living systems into reciprocal bonded patterns.
The baby provides the precise stimulus for mother to open
and develop new capacities, and mother does the same for
her baby. Their language is non-verbal; sensation and
feeling. Nature assumes this bond will develop and places
baby close to the mother's body and breast for just this
reason, and for an extended period of time. Interfering
with this close, intimate, skin-to-skin contact prevents
a vital exchange of sensory experiences, nutrients and
information required for normal and healthy brain development.
The absence of what we call bonding is neglect and abuse.
Recently researchers at the McLean Hospital identified
four types of permanent brain abnormalities caused by
early childhood abuse and neglect. These and many other
studies confirm what James W. Prescott, Ph.D., and associates
discovered in the 1960's and 1970's; that lack of affectionate,
intimate contact between mothers and infants during the
most sensitive periods of brain growth may result in permanent
brain abnormalities associated with juvenal and adult
patterns of depression, substance abuse, eating disorders,
aggression and violence.
Today the mirrored-reciprocal relationship we call bonding
is threatened. Mothers are not valued, nurtured or supported
by the culture. Drugs and technological birth practices
routinely separate mothers and babies during the most
sensitive bonding period. Single parent families, an euphemism
for single moms, without the support, mentoring, and nurturing
of extended families and communities, routinely place
the majority of infants and young children in institutional
childcare for extended periods of time, shortly after
birth. Lack of initial bonding, institutional childcare,
and social pressures, such as work schedules and welfare
reform prevent most mothers from bonding with and breast-feeding
their babies.
Nothing can quite replace the loving touch and nurturing
a mother provides for her baby, and through her touch
she nurtures all of humanity. And what about fathers?
It is the primary role of males to protect and support
the women they love, so they can nurture all our children.
Maria Montessori claimed that humankind abandoned in this
early formative period becomes the worst threat to its
own survival. To betray this essential need for nurturing
which means loving, pleasurable touch and body contact,
especially in males, who are biologically most vulnerable
early in life, results in increasing numbers of juvenile
and adult males who batter, abuse and rape females, the
true source of the nurturing they need. And this cycle
of violence spreads throughout society and the world.
What you will find in this section, Bonding & Violence,
is the historical research, the politics, interviews,
past publications and copies of rare footage documenting
how an absence of nurturing, affection, playful movement
and breast feeding results in a variety of brain abnormalities
associated with depression, aggression, impulse dyscontrol,
substance abuse, obesity and violence.
Some of the information is highly technical, archived
here for historical and research purposes. All is accessible
and may be of interest to interested parents, educators,
health and child care professionals.
In 1952 John Steinbeck wrote in East of Eden:
"The greatest terror a child can have is that he
is not loved, and rejection is the hell he fears. I think
everyone in the world to a large or small extent has felt
rejection. And with rejection comes anger, and with anger
some kind of crime in revenge for the rejection, and with
the crime guilt--and there is the story of mankind."
Dr. Prescott's pioneering research found here explains
the Origins of Love & Violence, dramatically, clearly.
It is an honor to have his work represented here as part
of
Touch the Future.
Michael Mendizza
The Origins of Love & Violence:
An Overview
by James W. Prescott, Ph.D.
28 March 2002 Introduction
This past century can be considered the Century of Violence
where more humans have destroyed each other than in any
other time in human history. This new Century was shocked
into its existence when two airplane bombs were crashed
into the twin towers of the World Trade Century by Islamic
religious extremists that destroyed those twin towers
with the loss of over 3,000 lives and which left over
10,000 children without a mother or father. The terrorism
of religious violence is unique to the human primate
and came into existence with the birth of monotheism,
as Gibbon (1776-1788) noted in The Decline and Fall of
the Roman Empire. The polytheistic cultures of antiquity
never went to war over religion, according to Gibbon.
Although, monotheistic religious violence is a secondary
factor in the genesis of human violence, it will be shown
how the monotheistic religious moral values of pain and
pleasure in human relationships have shaped the developing
brain of humanity for depression, social alienation, anger/rage
and violence.
The human primate is, without question, the most violent
primate on the planet who directs more violence against
the female and offspring of its species than by any other
primate species on the planet. Why is our closest genetic
relative the bonobo or pygmy chimpanzee the most peaceful
and affectionate primate on the planet? There is only
about 1% genetic difference (DNA) between these two species
where this small genetic difference cannot possibly account
for the extraordinary differences in peaceful and violent
behaviors between these two primate species. The explanation
for the pathological violence of the human primate lies
elsewhere and recent studies reveal that the answer is
to be found in how the developing brain is encoded or
programmed for peaceful or violent behaviors in the newborn/infant/child
by how it is reared.
Sarah Hardy in Mother Nature (1999) observed that "no
wild monkey or ape mother has ever been observed to
deliberately harm her own baby". Why does the human
primate harm its own offspring when no genes can be
identified to account for this harm nor for the current
epidemics of violence that have grown over this past
generation which precludes any changes in the human
gene pool to account for this difference (Prescott,
2001 ab).
The answer to this question is to be found in the betrayal
of millions of years of mammalian evolutionary biology
by the human primate. This betrayal has two significant
components:
a) how human infants/children are not nurtured which
equates with the lack of affectional somatic bonding
in the mother-infant/child relationship; and
b) suppression of the normal development of sexual
affectional bonds during the post puberty years that
exists for all mammals except for the human mammal.
It will be shown that it is the impaired development
of the pleasure systems of the brain that results from
failed affectional bonding in the mother-infant/child
relationship and in the failed sexual affectional bonding
during the juvenile/adolescent stages of development,
which have placed the human primate on a life path for
depression, social alienation and violence. Tragically,
the moral traditions of the monotheistic religions have
contributed significantly to this life path of self-destruction
in homo sapiens where pain and suffering (biological
avoidance) has become a virtue; and pleasure (biological
attraction) has become a sin that must be avoided. This
moral theology has wrecked havoc with the natural and
normal integrative bio-psychological development of
homo sapiens, which has resulted in the development
of the neurodissociative brain that mediates the neurodissociative
behaviors of depression, alienation and violence.
The basic reciprocal inhibitory relationship in the
brain between pain and pleasure, between peace and violence
must be recognized as fundamental neurobiological and
neuropsychological processes that have been developed
through millions of years of mammalian evolutionary
biology that regulate peaceful and violent behaviors.
Evolutionary Mammalian Biology Betrayed
No mammal on this planet, except the human mammal, separates
the newborn from its mother at birth and during the
crucial and formative postnatal period of brain-behavioral
development. No mammal on this planet, except the human
mammal, refuses to breastfeed its newborn and during
the crucial and formative periods of breastfeeding for
brain-behavioral development that varies with mammalian
species. The violation of these two mammalian universals
by the human primate-homo sapiens-has brought devastating
consequences upon itself in terms of damaged biological
and emotional-social health that threatens the very
existence of the species.
It is worth noting that the bonobo chimpanzee, which
is the most peaceful primate on the planet, breastfeed
their young to about four years of age; the mother carries
her offspring on her body through early adolescence
(particularly male offspring); and where multiple male/female
sexual relationships are commonplace which are characterized
by the lack of aggression or violence (Diamond, 1992;
De Waal and Lanting, 1997, Prescott, 2001).
Newman (1995) has summarized the essential role of
breastfeeding for healthy human development where WHO/UNICEF
(1990) have recommended breastfeeding for "two
years of age or beyond" that, inexplicably, is
not supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics
(AAP, 1997). Laudenslager, et al. (1982) have documented
impaired immune system development from mother-infant
separations (includes lack of breastfeeding). We shall
see that breastfeeding of the human primate for 2.5
years or greater is essential to optimize the health
benefits (biological and psychosocial) of breastfeeding
for child and mother.
Bowlby/Montagu and Attachment v Watson/Holt and
non-Attachment.
There is a long history of warnings from child and human
development authorities on the dangers inherent in separating
infants from their mothers. Bowlby (1950), in a report
on Maternal Care and Mental Health and in Child Care
and the Growth of Love (1951) to the World Health Organization
(WHO) warned the world of the consequences of increasing
mother-infant/child separations associated with institutional
child day care:
"Deprived children, whether in their own homes
or out of them, are the source of social infection as
real and serious as are the carriers of diphtheria and
typhoid."
"The break-up of families and the shunting of illegitimates
are accepted without comment."
"One must beware of a vested interest in the institutional
care of children."
Renee Spitz (1946/1965) documented that infants isolated
in cribs with little or no physical contact and physical
affection can die from an emotional wasting away, which
he called marasmus, even though medical and physical
care were normal. Montagu (1971) has provided a history
of two national historical sources that have opposed
bonding in the mother-infant/child relationship and
which established wrongful child rearing practices in
America for this past century and which continues to
this day.
Watson (1928) in his book Psychological Care of Infant
and Child stated: "
a sensible way of treating
children
Never hug and kiss them, never let them
sit on your lap. If you must, kiss them once on the
forehead when they say good night."
Luther Emmett Holt (1894), the leading pediatric authority
of his day, stated in his textbook: "To induce
sleep, rocking and all other habits of this sort are
useless and may be harmful"; and later in 1916
advised that the crib should not rock in order that
"the unnecessary and vicious practice may not be
carried on". Holt could not have been in greater
error, as we now know that gentle rocking (movement)
of the infant/child is essential for normal brain-behavioral
development and bonding. See
http://www.violence.de/tv/rockabye.html, which was
premiered at the 1970 White House Conference on Children.
Liedloff (1975) has documented the importance of baby
carrying and affectional bonding between mother and
infant/child in her single culture study. Joseph Chilton
Pearce reinforced the significance of bonding in Magical
Child (1977):
"Bonding is the issue, regardless of age. Bonding
is a psychological-biological state, a vital physical
link that coordinates and unifies the entire biological
system. Bonding seals a primary knowing that is the
basis for rational thought."
Cook (1996) has provided a review of how infants and
nations are placed at risk with early child institutional
care that ensures lack of bonding. For over a century
we have been given wrongful and disastrous advice by
"authorities" in pediatrics and psychology
that continues to this day. Ferber (1985), a pediatrician,
states:
"If your child is like this, you may be comforted
to know that headbanging, body rocking, and head rolling
are very common in early childhood and, at least at
this age, are usually normal. If your child exhibits
any of these behaviors there is little need for concern
about emotional difficulties or neurological illness"
p.193; and "In the infant and young toddler, rhythmic
patterns are of little significance and you will not
need to intervene" (p.197).
Dr. Ferber could not be in greater error and his statements
indicate that it is imperative that all pediatricians
be required to view the Time Life documentary, "Rock
a Bye Baby" and the other video documentaries which
document the inherent pathology of body rocking and
other stereotypical behaviors consequent to the sensory
deprivation of mother love (SSAD). These video documentaries
are available here.
Spock (1972), and Ferber (1985) have advocated letting the infant/child engage in pathological
chronic crying, e.g., crying itself to sleep, that has
pathological consequences of extreme adreno-cortical
stress reactions that adversely affect brain-behavioral
development (Selye, 1956; Prescott, 2001). Another commentary
by Dr. Ferber is so egregious that it also deserves
reporting:
"A normal child will not injure himself seriously
while headbanging, although he occasionally may bruise
his forehead and, very rarely, there may be a small
amount of bleeding. Concussions, fractured skull, or
brain injuries just do not occur. The main damage is
to furniture and walls" (p.198).
It is beyond comprehension to understand how forces
so great that damages furniture and walls do not damage
the immature developing brain. Microlesions of the brain
that cannot be detected today can have long term developmental
brain consequences years later, as the studies of Faro
and Windle (1969) have demonstrated on the effects of
birth asphyxia upon the developing brain.
The award-winning Time-Life documentary, Rock a Bye
Baby, that was premiered at the 1970 White House Conference
on Children, dramatizes NICHD supported research findings
of impaired brain-behavioral development with mother-infant
separations and the necessity of body movement and rocking
of the newborn/infant for normal brain-behavioral development.
The classic studies by Mason (1968) and Mason and Berkson
(1975), which demonstrated that artificial movement
by a swinging mother surrogate could prevent depression
and violence in the separated infant, is required viewing
by all who have an interest in optimizing healthy development
of the newborn/infant/child and can be viewed at:
http://www.violence.de/tv/rockabye.html
It is well known that early life experiences have
a profound effect upon brain-behavioral development,
which has been demonstrated from a rich variety of both
animal and human studies. The studies of Salk, et al
(1985) found prenatal and perinatal stress factors in
81% of teen suicides and the Jacobson group in Sweden
(Jacobson, et al, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1998/2000) found
increased risks for homicide, suicide and drug addictions
in adulthood-- as a consequence of obstetrical medication
(and other perinatal traumas)-which were as high as
500% compared to control groups with no obstetrical
medications. These studies illustrate how critical early
life experiences effect life-long developmental consequences
upon the brain and behavior and that true prevention
must begin before birth and during the formative postnatal
periods of brain-behavioral development.
NICHD Studies Document Impaired Brain Development
With Loss of Mother Love
When Dr. Prescott joined the newly formed National
Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD),
NIH he formed the Developmental Behavioral Biology Program
and became its Health Scientist Administrator from 1966-1980.
A major focus of this NICHD research program was to
understand why depression and violence results from
maternal-infant/child separations. Caspar Weinberger,
then Secretary of the Department of Health, Education
and Welfare-DHEW (renamed the Department of Health and
Human Services-DHHS), directed the NICHD to expand its
studies to uncover the origins of child abuse and neglect
and of violence in the home.
As a developmental neuropsychologist and cross-cultural
psychologist, Dr. Prescott focused the NICHD program
efforts on developing research programs to understand
how loss of early maternal-infant bonding-- as sensory
deprivation of somatic maternal love and nurturing--
affects the developing primate brain that could account
for the pathologies of depression and violence that
results from such early separations.
In a number of NICHD supported studies with other scientists,
a number and variety of developmental brain disorders
were found in pathologically violent adult mother deprived
monkeys who had a history of depression and psychotic
behaviors. Dr. Prescott formulated the S-SAD (SomatoSensory
Affectional Deprivation) theory of brain function that
could account for these emotional-social behavioral
disorders which included the limbic-fronto-cerebellar
complex in mediating peaceful and violent behaviors.
A number of studies have confirmed the validity of this
theory. See http://www.violence.de
In a series of NICHD supported cross-cultural studies,
Dr. Prescott found that he could predict with 80% accuracy
the peaceful or homicidal violent nature of 49 tribal
cultures from a single measure of bonding in the mother-infant
relationship, namely, carrying of the infant throughout
the day on the body of mother/allomother through the
first year of life. The peaceful or violent nature of
the remaining ten cultures could be accurately predicted
from whether the culture permitted or punished youth
sexual affectional relationships. In brief, these two
variables of physical affectional bonding could predict
with 100% accuracy the peaceful or violent nature of
these 49 tribal cultures distributed throughout the
world (Prescott, 1975,1979,1996). Crocker and Crocker
(1994) have provided a detailed analysis of the vanishing
matrilineal Canela tribe of the Brazil Amazon that dramatizes
the relationship of high infant/child nurturance and
support of youth and adult sexual affectional expression
with non-violence.
In a series of subsequent cross-cultural tribal studies,
Dr. Prescott found that 77% of 26 tribal cultures whose
weaning age was 2.5 years or longer were rated low or
absent in suicidal violence. Further, he found significant
differences in suicidal behaviors between cultures with
weaning age of 2.0 years or less v 2.5 years or greater.
This finding suggests that a critical period of brain
development exists at this age to mediate this effect.
These and other data suggest that breastfeeding for
2.5 years or longer is required to optimize the health
benefits of breastfeeding for child and mother (Zheng,
2000). These breastfeeding effects are undoubtedly mediated,
in large part, by the rich presence of the amino acid
tryptophan in breastmilk that is deficient in infant
formula milk and which is necessary for normal brain
serotonin development. See Table 2. Deficits in brain
serotonin are well recognized as a brain condition that
mediates depression, impulse dyscontrol and the violence
of suicide and homicide (Prescott, 1996,1997, 2001).
See:
http://www.violence.de/prescott/ttf/article.html
http://www.violence.de/coleman/article.html
http://www.ttfuture.org/pdf/Prescott-ALD.PDF
This issue of duration of breastfeeding for optimal
biological and mental-social health is particularly
urgent when it is recognized that only 6.8%
of American mothers are breastfeeding at 12 months;
2.7% are breastfeeding at 24months; and only
1% at 30 months or more (Hediger, 2001; Prescott,
2001). These statistics on breastfeeding become even
more alarming in the light of child and youth suicidal
deaths which have doubled in the 5-14 year age group
over this past generation and has been the third leading
cause of death in the 15-24 year age group over this
past generation. Further, for the 5-14 year age group
the ratio of suicide rates to homicide rates have consistently
increased over this past generation, as follows: 1979--36
%; 1994--60%; 1998--73%. It is also
a sobering statistic to note that more children and
youth (5-24 year age group) have died from suicidal
death in the past ten years (est 55,000) than combat
lives lost during the ten year Vietnam War (47, 355).
Yet, no memorial has been established for these children
of suicidal death.
It should be noted that the American Academy of Pediatrics
in its 1997 revision of its breastfeeding recommendations
did not acknowledge the research studies that confirmed
tryptophan deficits in infant formula milk which compromises
normal brain development and places infants/children
at high risk for the development of depression, impulse
dyscontrol, drug abuse and suicidal/ homicidal violence.
Further and inexplicably, the AAP did not affirm the
recommendations of WHO and UNICEF that breastfeeding
should be for "two years of age or beyond"
(AAP, 1997; WHO/UNICEF, 1990). What does WHO and UNICEF
know that the AAP does not know?
These data demand studies to evaluate the harmful effects
of infant formula milk upon brain development and behavior
compared to breastfeeding for "two years of age
or beyond" and to evaluate the history of duration
of breastfeeding in child and youth suicides and those
with a history of depression and psychiatric medication.
The NIH, inexplicably, refuses to conduct these studies.
NICHD Early Child Day Care Study
The report of the NICHD (National Institute of Child
Health and Human Development) Study of Early Child Care
(SECC) found that infants and very young children who
spend more than 30 hours a week in child care "are
far more demanding, more noncompliant, and they are
more aggressive" and "They scored higher on
things like gets in lots of fights, cruelty, bullying,
meanness as well as talking too much, demands must be
met immediately", according to Dr.Belsky, one of
the principle investigators" (Stolberg, New York
Times, April 19, 2001) (emphasis mine)
Dr. Sarah Friedman, NICHD Scientific Project Officer
was reported as saying ""We cannot and should
not hide the findings but I don't want to create a mass
hysteria when I don't know what explains these results"
(Stolberg, 2001). Unfortunately, no measures of biological
stress disorders were incorporated into this study nor
was there any awareness of the early NICHD studies in
the 1960s and 1970s, which documented these behaviors
in the maternally deprived young.
It has yet to be recognized that cruelty, bullying
and meanness that terrorizes so many of our children
and youth in our elementary schools and high schools
have their roots in the emotional trauma of mother-infant/child
separations associated with institutionalized day care
and from other separations These collective emotional-social
traumas are sufficiently great to establish an unstable
brain that combined with other stress experiences compels
many students to despair and the violent acts of homicide
and suicide. It is estimated that some 20% of our nation's
students have contemplated suicide at one time or another
(Moran, 2000; Silverman, et al 200l; Prescott, 2001).
What is wrong with America and American families that
drive so many of our youth to depression, despair and
suicide?
Belsky (2001), a member of the research team of the
NICHD-SECC, has published his most recent findings and
conclusions regarding the damaging emotional-social
effects of infant and early child day care.
Evidence indicating that early, extensive, and continuous
nonmaternal care is associated with less harmonious
parent-child relations and elevated levels of aggression
and noncompliance suggest that concerns raised about
early and extensive child care 15 years ago remain valid
and that alternative explanations of Belsky's originally-controversial
conclusion do not account for seemingly adverse effects
of routine nonmaternal care that continue to be reported
in the literature. (Abstract)
Ultimately, hard
headed work is called for to gain insight into the developmental
mechanisms that give rise to the aggressive and noncompliant
behavior so often found to be related to early, extensive,
and continuous nonmaternal child care. For sure the
road does not end with the NICHD-SECC (p.35, ms, emphasis
mine).
Unfortunately, the road that gained insight into the
developmental mechanisms that mediate the aggressive,
noncompliant and other disordered emotional-social behaviors,
e.g. depression and suicide consequent to mother-infant/child
separations-- which was illuminated by the Time Life
documentary "Rock a Bye Baby"-- was blocked
and terminated by the NICHD in the late 1970s. The NICHD
unlawfully abandoned its agency responsibility to continue
to support research on the causes and consequences of
violence against children and failed to recommend implementation
of national health programs for the prevention of this
violence. These unlawful NICHD/NIH actions has not only
set-back scientific advances in this field for over
a quarter of a century but more importantly has resulted
in the epidemics of depression, drug abuse, psychiatric
medications and violence that characterizes this nation
today with a substantial loss of child and youth life
due to suicidal and homicidal deaths that are mostly
preventable.
See
http://www.violence.de/history/coverup.html
Past Is Prologue--Report to the President. 1970
White House Conference on Children
Never has this White House Conference come at
a time of greater national questioning
The Conference
can and will define problems, seek new knowledge, evaluate
past successes and failures, and outline alternative
courses of action.
President Richard M. Nixon, December 5, 1969
Minority Report of Forum 15. Chairman, Urie Bronfenbrenner.
I take issue with the accompanying document on
two major counts.
First, the report, in my judgement fails to convey the
urgency and severity of the problem confronting the
nation's families and their children. Second, the document
underestimates and consequently fails to alert the reader
to the critical role played by business and industry--both
private and public--in determining the life style of
the American family and the manner in which parent and
children are treated in American society. I shall speak
to each of these points in turn
.(and) America's
families, and their children, are in trouble, trouble
so deep and pervasive as to threaten the future of our
nation. The source of the trouble is nothing less than
a national neglect of children and those primarily engaged
in their care--America's parents. (and) The Editorial
Committee objected to this statement on the grounds
that it applied only to a minority of the nation's children
and that, therefore, no note of urgency was justified.
I strongly disagree (p. 252) (Hess, 1970)
It is transparent that the 1970 White House Conference
on Children was a failure, as the prescient words of
Professor Urie Bronfenbrenner attest. The children,
youth and families of America are worse off today--
by any health statistic-- than they were in 1970-over
thirty years ago. This massive failure of America can
be laid at the doorsteps of the Congress and its political
parties; The White House; the National Institutes of
Health and the Department of Health and Human Services,
which over this past generation have failed to support
mothers being nurturing mothers and which continues
to this day. America has truly lost it's dream of "
Life,
Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness". The disintegration
of America from within is well on its way.
Summary, Conclusions and Recommendations
The realization of peaceful and harmonious behaviors
at the individual and cultural level can only be obtained
with a neurointegrative brain and not with a neurodissociative
brain. These two brains are formed through the developmental
sensory processes of pleasure stimulation or pleasure
deprivation that is mediated first through the mother-infant/child
pleasure bonding relationship or its absence. Sexual
affectional bonding relationships during puberty/postpubertal
development builds upon this first foundation of love
in the mother-infant/child relationship that also promotes
peaceful, harmonious and egalitarian relationships.
Integrated pleasure but not dissociative pleasure inhibits
depression and violence. Dissociative pleasure leads
to sexual exploitation and violence, particularly child
and teen sexual abuse. It would be a rare event to find
any rapist or other sex offender, murderer or drug addict
that has been breast fed for 2.5 years or longer in
any culture and who have realized youth sexual affectional
relationships.
A radical transformation is needed of the philosophical
dualistic and theistic theologies of "Western Civilization"
that have mandated and supported gender inequality with
the subversion and violation of millions of years of
mammalian evolutionary biology concerning the role of
pain and pleasure in mammalian relationships, particularly
human primate relationships.
The four primary life changes that are required to
transform the individual and culture from one of authoritarianism
and violence to one of egalitarian and peaceful relationships
are:
1. Society must support mothers being nurturing
mothers that includes breastfeeding for 2.5 years or
greater.
2. Society must support mothers (and fathers) in
being nurturing parents by supporting the continuous
carrying of the infant on the body of mother/father
throughout the day during the first year of life.
3. All forms of intentional infliction of physical/emotional
pain and punishment must be eliminated from the life
of the infant/child that begins in many infants with
circumcision.
4. Society must support the emerging sexuality of
children and youth and support them in the natural expression
of their inherent sexuality that is free from exploitation
and punishment.
Implementation of the Ten Principles would provide
a greater comprehensive structure for the assurance
of peaceful individuals and cultures (Table 1). In light
of the above and other evidence, it is difficult to
comprehend that maternal-infant bonding is considered
a fiction (Eyre, 1992) and that mother nurture is of
lesser importance than peer groups for child and human
development (Harris, 1998).
It is with some alarm to note than none of the above
NICHD/NIH history of research studies and scientific
breakthroughs made in the 1960s and 197Os have been
referenced in the report of the National Research Council,
Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences,
From Neurons to Neighborhoods: The Science of Early
Childhood Development (Shonkoff and Phillips, 2000).
See also
http://www.violence.de/prescott/report/part1.html
(Prescott, 1993) nor in the "Report of the Panel
on NIH Research on Antisocial, Aggressive, and Violence-Related
Behaviors and their Consequences", Panel Meetings
in June and September 1993, published April 1994 at
http://www.violence.de/history/coverup.html
It is inexplicable that the scientific reports from
the offices of the DHHS Surgeon General; National Institute
of Mental Health; National Institute of Child Health
and Human Development; and National Academy of Sciences
are silent on this rich NICHD developmental scientific
data that are relevant to the prevention of the brain-behavioral
disorders induced by child abuse and neglect (S-SAD)
and which contribute to later suicidal and homicidal
behaviors. (NIH, 1994; Overpeck, et al, 1998; Surgeon
General Satcher, 1999ab, 2000; NRC, 1993ab).
Further, it is again emphasized that the failure of
the American Academy of Pediatrics to note in its revised
statement on breastfeeding (AAP, 1997) the many studies
that document deficiencies of the essential amino acid
tryptophan in infant formula milk that compromises normal
brain serotonin development and which induces depression,
impulse dyscontrol and violence is also inexplicable
(Prescott, 1996, 2001).
See Table 2 and
http://www.violence.de/prescott/ttf/article.html
It is also extremely doubtful, given the documented
deficiencies of tryptophan in infant formula milk, that
such a commercial preparation meets the magnitude of
requirements of the other essential amino acids for
infants that have been established by WHO. Table 2 lists
the infant requirements for the essential amino acids
compared to adult requirements (Merck Manual 1987).
The damaging effects of such nutritional deficiencies
in infant formula milk upon the developing brain, specifically
brain neurotransmitters, have yet to be evaluated. The
recent authorization by the FDA to provide the nutritional
additives of two fatty acids, DHA (Docosahexaenoic Acid)
and AA (Arachidonic Acid)-essential nutrients for brain
development-to infant formula milk attests to the additional
recognition that infant formula milk is malnutrition
for normal brain development (Cunnane, et.at, 2000;
Brody, 2001).
Clearly, life has deteriorated for America's children
and youth since the 1970 White House Conference on Children.
A radical reconstruction of American Society is needed
that must give support to mothers being nurturing mothers
which includes support of breastfeeding for 2.5 years
or longer that is in accordance with the recommendations
of WHO and UNICEF. Duration of breastfeeding for 2.5
years or greater appears to be necessary to optimize
brain development and the health benefits of breastfeeding,
if a life path of depression, alienation, drug abuse
and the violence of suicidal and homicidal deaths of
our children and youth are to be significantly reduced
and prevented.
It is imperative that national legislation, which interferes
with mother-infant/child bonding, is abolished and those
nursing mothers are exempt from the 1996 Welfare Reform
Act which prevents breastfeeding and bonding between
mother and infant/child. Infant and early institutional
child day care should be abolished where the public
funds utilized to support these commercial enterprises
are used to support mothers being nurturing mothers.
The
greatest terror a child can have is that he is not loved,
and rejection is the hell he fears. I think everyone
in the world to a large or small extent has felt rejection.
And with rejection comes anger, and with anger some
kind of crime in revenge for the rejection, and with
the crime guilt--and there is the story of mankind.
John, Steinbeck--East of Eden, 1952
THE CHILD IS THE FATHER OF THE MAN
THE CHILD IS THE MOTHER OF CULTURE
THE CHILD IS THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY
| TABLE
1
TEN PRINCIPLES OF MOTHER-INFANT
BONDING FOR HEALTH, HAPPINESS
and HARMONY
I. Every Pregnancy Is A Wanted Pregnancy.
Every Child Is A Wanted Child.
Unwanted children are typically unloved, abused
and neglected who become the next
generation of delinquents, violent offenders
and alcohol/drug abusers and addicts.
II. Every Pregnancy Has Proper Nutrition
& Prenatal Care--medical and psychological
-- and is free from alcohol, drugs, tobacco
and other harmful agents of stress.
III. Natural Birthing--avoid wherever
possible obstetrical medications, forceps
& induced labor with no episiotomy nor
premature cutting of umbilical cord. Mother
controls birthing position with no separation
of newborn from mother. Newborn maintains
intimate body contact with mother for breastfeeding
and nurturance.
IV. No Circumcision of newborn. The
traumatic pain of newborn circumcision adversely
affects normal brain development, impairs
affectional bonding with mother and has long
lasting effects upon how pain and pleasure
are experienced in life.
V. Breastfeeding On Demand by newborn/infant/child
and for "two years or beyond", as
recommended by the World Health Organization
(WHO) and UNICEF. Failure to breastfeed results
in positive harm to normal brain development
& to the immunological health of the newborn,
infant and child. Encoding the developing
brain with the smell of mother's body through
breastfeeding is essential for the later development
of intimate sexuality.
VI. Intimate Body Contact is maintained
between mother and newborn/infant by being
carried continuously on the body of the mother
for the first year of life. Such continuous
gentle body movement stimulation of the newborn/infant
promotes optimal brain development and "Basic
Trust" for peaceful/happy behaviors.
Mother-infant co-sleeping is encouraged for
"two years or beyond". Mother-infant/child
body contact can also be optimized with daily
infant/child massage. The Father must also
learn to affectionately bond with his infant
and child by being an additional source of
physical affection.
VII. Immediate Comforting is given
to infants and children who are crying. No
infant/child should ever be permitted to cry
itself to sleep.
VIII. Infants and Children Are For Hugging
and should never be physically hit for any
reason. Merging childhood parental love with
parental violent pain helps create adult violent
love.
IX. Infants and Children Are Honored
and should never be humiliated nor emotionally
abused for any reason. The emerging sexuality
of every child is respected.
X. Mothers Must Be Honored
and not replaced by Institutional Day Care
which emotionally harms children before three
years of age. Mother-Infant/Child Community
Development Centers must replace Institutionalized
Day Care. |
TABLE 2
ESTIMATED DAILY REQUIREMENTS (MG/KG) OF THE ESSENTIAL
AMINO ACIDS
FOR INFANT, CHILD AND ADULT
| Amino
Acid |
Adult |
Infant |
% Adult |
Child |
|
Histidine |
16 |
26 |
163 |
19 |
|
Isoleucine |
13 |
46 |
354 |
28 |
|
Leucine |
19 |
93 |
489 |
44 |
|
Lycine |
16 |
66 |
247 |
44 |
|
Methionine/Cystine |
17 |
42 |
235 |
22 |
|
Phenylalanine & Tyrosine |
19 |
72 |
379 |
22 |
|
Threonine |
09 |
43 |
478 |
28 |
|
Tryptophan |
05 |
17 |
340 |
09 |
|
Valine |
13 |
56 |
431 |
25 |
|
FROM: The Merck
Manual. Nutritional and Metabolic Disorders. P. 920.
Fifteenth Edition.1987. Merck & Co., Inc. Rathway,
NJ Infant percent value of adult requirements were calculated
and added to Table.
Modified from Energy and Protein Requirements.
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