Hugging Our Infants

Hugging Our Infants

The neuropsychologist James W. Prescott has performed a startling cross-cultural statistical analysis of 400 preindustrial societies and found that cultures that lavish physical affection on infants tend to be disinclined to violence. Even societies without notable fondling of infants develop nonviolent adults, provided sexual activity in adolescents is not repressed. Prescott believes that cultures with a predisposition for violence are composed of individuals who have been deprived – during at least one of two critical stages in life, infancy and adolescence – of the pleasures of the body. Where physical affection is encouraged, theft, organized religion and invidious displays of wealth are inconspicuous; where infants are physically punished, there tends to be slavery, frequent killing, torturing and mutilation of enemies, a devotion to the inferiority of women, and a belief in one of more supernatural beings who intervene in daily life.

Mammals characteristically nuzzle, fondle, hug, caress, pet, groom, love their young, behavior essentially unknown among the reptiles. If it is really true that the R-complex and limbic systems live in an uneasy truce within our skills and still partake of their ancient predelictions, we might expect affectionate parental indulgence to encourage our mammalian natures, and the absence of physical affection to prod reptilian behavior. There is some evidence that this is the case.

In laboratory experiments, Harry and Margaret Harlow found that monkeys raised in cages and physically isolated – even though they could see, hear and smell their simian fellows – developed a range of morose, withdrawn, self-destructive and otherwise abnormal characteristics. In humans the same is observed for children raised without physical affection – usually in institutions – where they are clearly in great pain.

We can each make a personal and noncontroversial contribution to the future of the world by hugging our infants tenderly. Image © 2011 Megan Jorgensen (Elena)

We do not understand human behavior well enough to be sure of the mechanisms underlying these relationships, although we can conjecture. But the correlations are significant. Prescott writes: “The percent likelihood of a society becoming physically violent if it is physically affectionate toward its infants and tolerant of premarital sexual behavior is 2 percent.

Infants hunger for physical affection; adolescents are strongly driven to sexual activity. If youngsters had their way, societies might develop in which adults have little tolerance for aggression, territoriality, ritual and social hierarchy (although in the course of growing up the children might well experience the reptilian behavior).

We have done worse than interrupt communications between the whales everywhere on our planet, because there persists to this day a traffic in the dead bodies of whales. There are still humans who hunt and slaughter whales and market the products for lipstick or industrial lubricant.

If Prescott is right, in an age of nuclear weapons and effective contraceptives, child abuse and severe sexual repression are crimes against humanity. More work on this provocative thesis is clearly needed. Meanwhile, we can each make a personal and noncontroversial contribution to the future of the world by hugging our infants tenderly.

hugging our infantsWe can each make a personal and noncontroversial contribution to the future of the world by hugging our infants tenderly. Image Gothic Art © 2011 Megan Jorgensen