cry at will. Imagine the power! He is learning that this vocal tool brings someone to his side. At this point, he may not be crying for a basic need like food or a clean diaper. He may be crying because he needs attention, something he received twenty-four hours a day in the uterus.
Attention is a serious need for infants. They may need a burp, they might have gas or indigestion, or they may be getting tired. They may be too warm. They may want to move—in someone's arms, a rocking chair, a stroller, or a car seat gliding down the highway. They may simply be lonely and want the sound of a human voice or a cuddle. Or maybe it's just that fussy time of the day, and all a parent can do is try to provide comfort as the crying runs its course. That kind of attention teaches him that a caring adult is still there for him, just as his mother was always there for him during the first three trimesters, in the happy times and through the inconsolable times.
EVOLUTION HAS MADE NEWBORNS ADORABLE FOR A REASON
There's a lot of crying and demanding coming from such a diminutive body. Researchers once held that crying was the sole biological siren that alerted and motivated mothers and caregivers to come to the rescue.4
Turns out, there's more going on in the initial communication. If crying were the only tie designed by evolution to connect babies’ needs and mothers’ responses, the human race might have died out millions of years ago. If high-pitched, incessant screaming were the only thanks mothers living in caves got for their pain and effort, they might have thrown up their hands in frustration and walked away in a huff—hang the future of the human race.
Luckily, infants have other ways of keeping caregivers hooked. Those other physical and behavioral skills, too, have been evolving over millions of years. Think “baby” and see wide eyes, round face, large head, chubby cheeks, small nose and mouth, short and thick extremities, and a plump body shape.5 It's likely that evolution favored infants with characteristics that are universally thought of as adorable. Combine it all in one package, and we're inspired to take care of the baby's every need. In evolutionary terms, our attraction to the endearing details of this demanding being ensures the survival of the human species.
Babies of just about any species are adorable to adult humans—think kittens, puppies, and penguins. Walt Disney, Steven Spielberg, and Jim Henson understood the human nurturing reaction very well as they created some of the most beloved characters in American culture. What else could explain the appeal of creatures like Mickey Mouse with his oversized head, ET with his (her?) enormous eyes, or Elmo with his short, pudgy body?
The bottom line is that it's a good thing for the human race that babies are so adorable. Infants with waiflike eyes, plump thighs, and other classically appealing characteristics trigger activity in the reward centers of our brains. In the 1950s, the Nobel laureate Konrad Lorenz described a set of baby characteristics universally considered “cute.” Those cute newborn attributes trigger a nurturing response and motivate us to respond with caretaking, Lorenz found. Our brains are wired to respond to typical baby adorableness. There is much more to our loving response than attempts to quiet those incessant wails of distress.
In 2009, a group of scientists brought technology to Lorenz's work. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging to observe brain activity, they observed the brains of a group of adults as they looked at photographs of classically cute infants. The researchers showed that the centers of the brain involved in nurturing and caretaking light up when adults look at photographs of chubby-cheeked, wide-eyed infants.6
It doesn't require a biological link to trigger the brain's reaction. The same response to adorable that is found in mothers and fathers is also found in all other adults and even in children. The appeal of a vulnerable infant generates a near-universal desire to help. “Can I hold her?” the older brother will ask, stretching his legs out the width of a couch as he tucks himself between pillows and promises to be very careful with her. Her very helplessness contains a survival tool that inspires mothers, fathers, big brothers and sisters, and all who gaze her way to provide care, support, and a sincere attempt to answer her needs.
There is within each of us a neurobiological explanation for why we feel the urge to take care of anything that resembles a baby—even a talking mouse, a little alien from outer space, or a fuzzy red Muppet.
A NEWBORN'S ABILITY TO CREATE A DIALOGUE
We know that crying is a vital part of communication between mother, father, or caregiver and baby. And being adorable is an important part of the dynamic. But what else is needed to keep parents involved in the round-the-clock, sleep-robbing, often frustrating task of keeping a newborn baby alive and safe?
“After six weeks, none of us would still be here if crying were the only thing to keep us attached to our mothers,” says Dr. Heidelise Als, director of Neurobehavioral Infant and Child Studies at Children's Hospital in Boston.7 Evolution required that infants develop other features if they were going to entice their mothers to hang in there with them. Dr. Als began looking at those evolved baby tricks by studying mother-infant interactions. She got to know mothers well enough during their pregnancies that they invited her into the delivery room. She watched, listened, and took notes as they first laid eyes on their offspring. ("You look like Uncle Louie.” “You're here, and you're all mine.”) She came back the next day, and the next, and the next and kept watching, all the while asking herself the same question: What impact is the baby having on the mother?
As time passed, Dr. Als found something that she didn't expect. There was a dialogue of facial expressions between mothers and newborns that immediately became a two-way street. From day one, the baby's open eyes made mother happy and inspired her words. The baby's yawn led to a winding down of the mother's words. A sneeze would elicit words of comfort. A scrunched-up face would trigger a tender laugh.8
Each baby, if you pay close attention, is keeping up his end of a conversation of signals, moods, and rhythms. He's helping to steer adult response, even as individual responses are teaching him to call up new conversational signals. Babies have ways of keeping the people who love and pay attention to them involved, and they'll begin the dialogue immediately with a birth mother, or with an adoptive parent or other committed caregiver, as soon as they get the chance. Those skills, refined through millions of years of evolution, prove to be enough to get the adults in their lives to put up with crying, sleeplessness, dirty diapers—and a transformation of life that new parents can't possibly have anticipated.
THEORIES ABOUT EXCESSIVE CRYING
Excessive crying happens a lot. In 10 percent to 25 percent of families, unexplained infant crying is the most common parental concern. The peak in crying time comes at about six weeks to two months, but can last until four to six months of age. Episodes of crying, nerve jangling for even minutes, can last for hours, with scarcely minutes of quiet respite.9
The traditional theory about excessive crying used to be that it was gas or an upset stomach. Now, unexplained and prolonged crying in the fourth trimester is seen primarily as an inability to regulate the sleep-wake cycle, or an immature ability to get to a calm state internally. An infant has normal states, ranging from deep, quiet sleep to fully awake lusty crying.10
Colicky or irritable babies are somewhat less organized in their initial sleep-wake cycles. While excessive crying generally peaks at about six weeks, and while, in about three months, most babies mature and possess a greater ability to calm themselves, some babies during the fourth trimester may be more sensitive to overstimulating environments. They get overwhelmed by a lot of activity in the household—a football game on the television, siblings fighting, the chaos of a routine dinner hour—and have not yet figured out how to soothe themselves and tamp down their arousal enough to fall asleep.
