In some famous experiments with macaques carried out in the late 1960s, the American psychologist Harry Harlow Demonstrated the importance of touch child attachment. The researcher separated several pups from their mothers as soon as they were born. Later, he presented them with two substitutes, one created with wire and with a bottle, and another with plush but without food. The babies clearly preferred the plush, comfortable, warm and soft one, and only approached the one that gave milk when they wanted to eat. This theory, known as the ‘soft mother’ It influenced parenting models in later years, so that parents are encouraged to hug and hold their children repeatedly. Failure to do so would be considered cruel.
Now, a new study with the same species of monkeys suggests that touch is also an important trigger of maternal love. These experiments, conducted by Margaret S. Livingstone of Harvard Medical School, show that mothers who have lost their young can also form strong and lasting bonds with soft inanimate objects, like stuffed animals The results, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), suggest that gentle touch “may be calming, therapeutic, perhaps even psychologically necessary, throughout life, not just in the babies”.
Livingston’s first sighting was an 8-year-old rhesus female named Ve. Her calf was stillborn. The caregivers lightly anesthetized her mother to remove the small corpse that she was holding against her chest. When she woke up a few minutes later, she showed “significant signs of distress”: she was vocalizing loudly and searching around the enclosure for something. Other monkeys housed in the same place also became agitated. The researcher placed a doll in the room, a soft and furry mouse about 15 cm long, without a face or eyes to avoid the danger of suffocation.
The female immediately picked up the stuffed animal and held it against her chest. She stopped screaming and calmed down. The entire room fell silent. She carried the doll on top of her for more than a week, with no signs of distress. According to Livingstone, during this time Ve behaved as any other mother would. She even became aggressive towards other monkeys or the keepers if they approached, a characteristic defensive behavior of females with young. About ten days after the failed delivery she discarded her stuffed animal with no problem. A year later she gave birth to and successfully raised a second baby.
calming effect
In all, Livingstone offered cuddly toys to five different females just after eight births in which the pups were removed. Three of them (Ve, Sv, and B2) picked up and carried the toy from about a week to several months. On some occasions the stuffed animal even fell apart. The other two (Ug and Sa) showed no interest in the toys and no distress after anesthesia.
In addition, the females preferred to ‘adopt’ soft toys rather than rigid ones of similar sizes. A furry reddish orangutan was chosen and kept for months. These stuffed animals matched a normal baby macaque in size, color, texture, and rough shape, but lacked odour, vocalization, movement, grasp, or sucking.
Interestingly, monkey B2 was asked to return her live calf six hours after giving birth because she had problems expelling the placenta and breastfeeding could help her, but she ignored it. Her attachment to the doll she had held during that time was greater than her attraction to her own waddling, screeching child.
For the researcher, these observations indicate that in postpartum macaques the maternal attachment drive can also be satisfied by holding a soft inanimate object. “The calming effect of the toy on the monkey was enormous, and using such substitutes may be a useful technique for relieving stress associated with infant death or withdrawal from brood in captive primates,” she notes.
Although the primate neurobiologist acknowledges that there is no way of knowing to what extent these observations relate to human maternal bonding, she believes that gentle touch can be calming and highly beneficial throughout life.
The results also indicate that attachment bonds, even those that appear to be based on complex, unique, or sophisticated qualities, may actually be triggered by simple sensory cues.