EBD Blog

Extreme differences in early care of children appears to be associated with differences in neuropeptides (amino acids present in neural tissues) released by children when they interact with their mothers versus unfamiliar women, according to a report by Alison B. Wismer Fries and colleages in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. As a part of Seth Pollock’s on-going research at the University of Wisconsin (Madison, WI, US) about how children’s emotional experiences alter their vulnerability to various forms of psychopathology, Fries and colleagues measured vasopressin and oxytocin neuropeptide systems under the two different conditions and found that children who were raised in typical family environments had different levels of the neuropeptide oxytocin after sessions with the strangers than sessions with their mothers, but children who began their lives in institutionalized settings did not have different levels of it. Here is Fries et al.’s abstract:

The formation of social attachments is a critical component of human relationships. Infants begin to bond to their caregivers from the moment of birth, and these social bonds continue to provide regulatory emotional functions throughout adulthood. It is difficult to examine the interactions between social experience and the biological origins of these complex behaviors because children undergo both brain development and accumulate social experience at the same time. We had a rare opportunity to examine children who were reared in extremely aberrant social environments where they were deprived of the kind of care-giving typical for our species. The present experiment in nature provides insight into the role of early experience on the brain systems underlying the development of emotional behavior. These data indicate that the vasopressin and oxytocin neuropeptide systems, which are critical in the establishment of social bonds and the regulation of emotional behaviors, are affected by early social experience. The results of this experiment suggest a potential mechanism whose atypical function may explain the pervasive social and emotional difficulties observed in many children who have experienced aberrant care-giving. The present findings are consistent with the view that there is a critical role for early experience in the development of the brain systems underlying basic aspects of human social behavior.

The study hinges on new techniques Fries and colleages used to measure oxytocin and vasopressin levels in urine. If they are borne out, the results will give a boost to attachment researchers, developmental psychologists who consider early development of secure relationships with adults as a critical element in subsequent psychological development.

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