Psychologists have long assumed that the first months after the birth of a child are especially important for the development of abilities for full communication, love and friendship, and the formation of stable social ties. Now this hypothesis has received direct biochemical confirmation.
Children deprived of contact with their parents immediately after birth run the risk of remaining emotionally, mentally and socially defective for life. Even the acquisition of a new full-fledged family and loving foster parents does not guarantee complete rehabilitation if the child spent the first 1-2 years of life in an orphanage.
Such a disappointing conclusion was reached by a group of psychologists led by Seth D. Pollak from the University of Wisconsin (Madison, USA), who published the results of their research in one of the most respected scientific journals — Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA (PNAS ).
It is known that a key role in the formation of full-fledged and emotionally rich interpersonal relationships is played by neuropeptides — signaling substances that determine the emotional status in humans and higher animals. It is difficult to feel sincere feelings for a person whose closeness causes us negative emotions or does not cause any. Contact with a loved one should normally lead to an increase in the concentration of certain neuropeptides (in particular, oxytocin) in the cerebrospinal fluid and blood. Otherwise, you will not experience any joy or pleasure from communication, even if you understand with your mind what a wonderful person he is and how much good he has done for you.
All this is by no means unique to humans. In other mammals (including those species that have monogamous families), the same hormonal emotional control system is responsible for the formation of stable attachments, which, from a biochemical point of view, are no different from human love.
Pollack and his colleagues studied a sample of 18 former orphans who spent the first months or years of life in an orphanage (from 7 to 42 months, on average 16,6), and then were adopted or adopted by prosperous, well-to-do families. By the time the experiment began, the children had spent 10 to 48 (36,4 on average) months under these comfortable conditions. As a «control» were used children living with their parents from birth.
The researchers measured levels of two key neuropeptides associated with social bonding (in both humans and animals): oxytocin and vasopressin. The methodological highlight of this study was that the level of neuropeptides was measured not in the cerebrospinal fluid and not in the blood (as is customary in such cases), but in the urine. This greatly simplified the task and made it possible not to injure children with repeated blood sampling, or even more so, cerebrospinal fluid. On the other hand, this created certain difficulties for the authors of the study. Not all of their colleagues agree with the statement that the concentration of neuropeptides in the urine is an adequate indicator of the level of synthesis of these substances in the body. Peptides are unstable, and most of them can be destroyed in the blood much before they enter the urine. The authors did not conduct special studies to confirm the correlation between the levels of neuropeptides in the blood and urine, they only refer to two rather old articles (1964 and 1987), which provide experimental data that support their point of view.
One way or another, it turned out that the level of vasopressin in former orphans is noticeably lower compared to «home» children.
An even more dramatic picture was obtained for another «communicative» neuropeptide — oxytocin. The basic level of this substance was approximately the same in former orphans and in the control group. The experiment set by psychologists was as follows: the children played a computer game sitting on their mother’s lap (native or adoptive), after which the level of oxytocin in the urine was measured and compared with the «baseline» measured before the start of the experiment. On another occasion, the same children were playing the same game on the lap of a strange woman.
It turned out that the level of oxytocin noticeably increases in «home» children after communicating with their mother, while playing together with an unfamiliar woman does not cause such an effect. In former orphans, oxytocin did not increase either from contact with a foster mother or from communication with a stranger.
These sad results show that the ability to enjoy communication with a loved one, apparently, is formed in the first months of life. Toddlers deprived during this critical period of the most important thing — contact with their parents — may remain emotionally impoverished for life, it will be difficult for them to adapt in society and create a full-fledged family.