{{Short description|Relationship between mother and child}} [[File:MaternalBond.jpg|thumb|right|A human mother holds up her child.]] [[File:Sea Lions Nuzzling.jpg|thumb|right|Mother sea lion and pup.]] [[File:Mother Yellow-bellied Marmot and pup kissing.jpg|thumb|right|A mother [[yellow-bellied marmot]] kissing her pup.]] A '''maternal bond''' is the [[interpersonal relationship|relationship]] between a [[biological mother]]/[[caregiver]] and her child or baby. While typically associated with [[pregnancy]] and [[childbirth]], a maternal bond may also develop in cases later on in life where the child is unrelated, such as in the case of an [[adoptee]] or a case of [[blended family]].
Both physical and emotional factors influence the mother-child [[Human bonding|bonding]] process. In [[separation anxiety disorder]], a child becomes fearful and nervous when away from a loved one, usually a parent or other caregiver. New mothers do not always experience instant love toward their child. Instead, the bond can strengthen over time, or fail to develop. Bonds can take hours, days, weeks, or months to develop.<ref name = "Winkler_2000">{{cite journal | vauthors = Winkler J | title = [Development of the maternal bond during pregnancy] | language = cs | journal = Casopis Lekaru Ceskych | volume = 139 | issue = 1 | pages = 5–8 | date = January 2000 | pmid = 10750284 | url = http://www.muni.cz/research/publications/314151 | trans-title = Development of the maternal bond during pregnancy }}</ref>
==Pregnancy== The maternal bond between a [[woman]] and her biological child usually begins to develop during [[pregnancy]]. The pregnant female often adapts her [[lifestyle (sociology)|lifestyle]] to suit the needs of the developing [[infant]]—for example, by eating or refraining from eating certain foods or undertaking or avoiding certain activities. At around 18 to 25 weeks, the mother begins to feel the fetus moving. Similar to seeing her child for the first time in an [[Medical ultrasound|ultrasound scan]], this experience often leads the mother to feel more attached to her child.{{Citation needed|date=October 2024}}
Once sufficiently developed, the developing [[fetus]] has some awareness of the mother's heartbeat and voice and can respond to touch or movement and hear sounds from the surrounding environment. By the seventh month of pregnancy, two-thirds of women report a strong maternal bond with their unborn child.<ref name = "Winkler_2000" />
Some mothers who [[unintended pregnancy|did not want the pregnancy]] may not have a close relationship with their child due to a sense of foreignness/unfamiliarity.<ref name="HP2020FP">{{cite web | title = Family Planning – Healthy People 2020 | url = Only 20% of mothers felt that they have an actual connection with a child, within hours of delivery. (steinfield) https://www.webmd.com/parenting/baby/forming-a-bond-with-your-baby-why-it-isnt-always-immediate http://healthypeople.gov/2020/topicsobjectives2020/overview.aspx?topicid=13 | website=HealthyPeople.gov | access-date = 2011-08-18}} This reference cites: * {{cite report |vauthors=Logan C, Holcombe E, Manlove J, etal |title=The consequences of unintended childbearing: A white paper |location=Washington | publisher=[[Child Trends]] |date=May 2007 |access-date=March 3, 2009 |url=http://www.childtrends.org/Files/Child_Trends-2007_05_01_FR_Consequences.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100702204001/http://www.childtrends.org/Files//Child_Trends-2007_05_01_FR_Consequences.pdf |archive-date=July 2, 2010 | url-status=dead}} * {{cite journal | vauthors = Cheng D, Schwarz EB, Douglas E, Horon I | title = Unintended pregnancy and associated maternal preconception, prenatal and postpartum behaviors | journal = Contraception | volume = 79 | issue = 3 | pages = 194–198 | date = March 2009 | pmid = 19185672 | doi = 10.1016/j.contraception.2008.09.009 }} * {{cite journal | vauthors = Kost K, Landry DJ, Darroch JE | title = Predicting maternal behaviors during pregnancy: does intention status matter? | journal = Family Planning Perspectives | volume = 30 | issue = 2 | pages = 79–88 | date = Mar–Apr 1998 | pmid = 9561873 | doi = 10.2307/2991664 | jstor = 2991664 }} * {{cite journal | vauthors = D'Angelo DV, Gilbert BC, Rochat RW, Santelli JS, Herold JM | title = Differences between mistimed and unwanted pregnancies among women who have live births | journal = Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health | volume = 36 | issue = 5 | pages = 192–197 | date = Sep–Oct 2004 | pmid = 15519961 | doi = 10.1111/j.1931-2393.2004.tb00022.x }} </ref> They are more likely to suffer from [[post-partum depression|postpartum depression]] or other mental health problems and less likely to [[Breastfeeding|breastfeed]].<ref name="HP2020FP" />
==Childbirth and post pregnancy== [[Childbirth]] is an experience that can strengthen the mother and child bond. Factors such as a traumatic birth, the mother's childhood, medical stress, lack of support and the influence of a spouse or partner/family or socioeconomic factors like poverty can weaken the bond.
Physical contact between infants and caregivers is very important to building, and bonding is still possible for infants which require hospital care, which reduces the opportunities for physical contact—for example, those infants who are born [[Preterm birth|prematurely]]. Parents and premature infants can still bond by cuddling and hugging, by touching in and around [[Neonatal intensive care unit|incubators]], and by playing, with [[Kangaroo care|skin-to-skin]] forms of contact particularly effective.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://raisingchildren.net.au/newborns/premature-babies-sick-babies/connecting-communicating/bonding-in-the-nicu | title=Bonding with sick or premature babies in the NICU }}</ref>
Emotional ''bonding theory'' first appeared in the mid-1970s <ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Spinner MR | title = Maternal-infant bonding | journal = Canadian Family Physician | volume = 24 | pages = 1151–1153 | date = November 1978 | pmid = 21301556 | pmc = 2379718 }}</ref> and bonding theories outlining descriptions and causes of good bonding and poor bonding were established understandings by the mid-1980s.
==Oxytocin== Production of [[oxytocin]] during childbirth and [[lactation]] increases [[parasympathetic]] activity. Thus, [[anxiety]] is theoretically reduced. Maternal oxytocin circulation is said to predispose women to bond and show bonding behavior,<ref name="Chi2012">{{cite book | vauthors = Chiras DD | name-list-style = vanc | title = Human Biology | date = 2012 | publisher = Jones & Bartlett Learning | location = Sudbury, MA | isbn = 978-0-7637-8345-7 | page = 262 | edition = 7th | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=mqlY1n8Ez1oC&pg=PA262 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | vauthors = Gray PB | chapter = The Evolution and Endocrinology of Human Behavior: Differences and Reproduction. | veditors = Muehlenbein MP | title = Human Evolutionary Biology | date = 2010 | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn = 978-1-139-78900-4 | pages = 277–292 (282) | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=3NRf_8gwmO8C&pg=PA282 | doi = 10.1017/CBO9780511781193.020 }}</ref> although this has been disputed.<ref>{{cite book | vauthors = Fillod O | chapter = Oxytocin as proximal cause of 'maternal instinct': weak science, post-feminism, and the hormones of mystique | veditors = Schmitz S, Höppner G |editor-link1=Sigrid Schmitz| title = Gendered neurocultures: feminist and queer perspectives on current brain discourses| publisher = Zaglossus | location = Wien | year = 2014 | isbn = 9783902902122 | series = challenge GENDER, 2 }}</ref>
[[Breastfeeding]] is also strongly believed to foster the bond, via touch, response and mutual gazing, as it stimulates the experience with the baby gazing up and down the mother and drinking from the mother's nipples.<ref>{{cite news | url = http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3749/is_200310/ai_n9302754 | title = Breastfeeding, bonding, and the mother-infant relationship | publisher = Merrill-Palmer Quarterly | vauthors = Else-Quest NM, Hyde JS, Clark R | date = 2003-10-01 | access-date = 2008-03-13 }}</ref>
==Maternal separation anxiety== Beginning at 9–10 months of age, when infants begin to crawl, and then when they begin to walk around 12 months of age, they begin to develop capacities to physically explore the world away from their mother.<ref>{{cite book | vauthors = Schaffer HR | date = 2004 | title = Introducing Child Psychology | location = Oxford | publisher = Blackwell | isbn = 978-0-631-21627-8 }}</ref> These capacities bring with them [[Separation anxiety disorder|separation anxiety]] as the infant becomes more vulnerable away from mother. This newly acquired motor development parallels infants' intellectual curiosity, and cognitive and language development as they begin to point and name, and jointly attend with mothers to their environment beginning by 9–10 months. Most parents welcome these explorations and this increased independence. However, in the context of maternal depression, trauma or disturbed bonding in her own early life, some mothers have significant difficulty in tolerating the exploration and/or the infant's anxiety.<ref name="pmid23756225">{{cite journal | vauthors = Pelaez M, Virues-Ortega J, Field TM, Amir-Kiaei Y, Schnerch G | title = Social referencing in infants of mothers with symptoms of depression | journal = Infant Behavior & Development | volume = 36 | issue = 4 | pages = 548–56 | date = December 2013 | pmid = 23756225 | doi = 10.1016/j.infbeh.2013.05.003 }}</ref>
This separation anxiety increases when infants and toddlers feel threatened or socially reference their mothers for reassurance. The research claimed out that mothers, for example, with histories of violence exposure and [[Posttraumatic stress disorder|post-traumatic stress]] show less activity in the [[medial prefrontal cortex]], a brain area that helps to temper and contextualize fear responses, and thus are likely unable to extinguish their fear response upon watching a videotaped mother-toddler separation scene in a [[magnetic resonance imaging]] scanner.<ref name="pmid26074844">{{cite journal | vauthors = Schechter DS, Moser DA, Paoloni-Giacobino A, Stenz L, Gex-Fabry M, Aue T, Adouan W, Cordero MI, Suardi F, Manini A, Sancho Rossignol A, Merminod G, Ansermet F, Dayer AG, Rusconi Serpa S | display-authors = 6 | title = Methylation of NR3C1 is related to maternal PTSD, parenting stress and maternal medial prefrontal cortical activity in response to child separation among mothers with histories of violence exposure | journal = Frontiers in Psychology | volume = 6 | issue = | pages = 690 | date = 2015 | pmid = 26074844 | pmc = 4447998 | doi = 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00690 | doi-access = free }}</ref>
== Child separation anxiety == Inevitably, children who have rarely been separated from their mother become anxious when separated for extended periods. This is most commonly experienced when starting to attend school. Separation anxiety can cause children to be unable to be open to new experiences such as attending school regularly. There is a relationship between child separation anxiety and school refusal.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Tekin |first1=Işıl |last2=Aydın |first2=Selami |date=November 2022 |title=School refusal and anxiety among children and adolescents: A systematic scoping review |journal=New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development |language=en |volume=2022 |issue=185–186 |pages=43–65 |doi=10.1002/cad.20484 |pmid=36161758 |s2cid=252536285 |issn=1520-3247|doi-access=free }}</ref>
Attachment happens after childbirth and does not form and is likely more fluid as people go further in later in life; this anxiety can reoccur if mothers have to leave their family unit to work. In both cases, the child's anxiety (and that of the parents) can be reduced by priming, i.e. preparing the child for the experience before its occurrence and by creating and maintaining dialogue and connection between the absent parent and child during the separation. Many children may experience such anxiety in various forms.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Wehry |first1=Anna M. |last2=Beesdo-Baum |first2=Katja |last3=Hennelly |first3=Meghann M. |last4=Connolly |first4=Sucheta D. |last5=Strawn |first5=Jeffrey R. |date=July 2015 |title=Assessment and Treatment of Anxiety Disorders in Children and Adolescents |journal=Current Psychiatry Reports |language=en |volume=17 |issue=7 |pages=52 |doi=10.1007/s11920-015-0591-z |issn=1523-3812 |pmc=4480225 |pmid=25980507}}</ref> Child separation anxiety may be a learned behaviour which can occur over time initiating from innate fears of separation or trauma.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Masson |first=Céline |date=2001 |title=Le supplice des mères : le fil de l'angoisse transgénérationnelle |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.3917/cm.064.0135 |journal=Cliniques méditerranéennes |volume=64 |issue=2 |pages=135–156 |doi=10.3917/cm.064.0135 |issn=0762-7491|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
== See also == * [[Postpartum confinement]] * [[Human bonding]] * [[Paternal bond]] * [[Cinderella effect]] * [[Mother's boy]] * [[Babywearing]], [[co-sleeping]] * [[Breastfeeding and mental health]]
==Footnotes== {{Reflist|30em}}
{{Parenting}} {{Evolutionary psychology}} {{Authority control}}
[[Category:Evolutionary psychology]] [[Category:Intimate relationships]] [[Category:Motherhood]]