Endocrine Abstracts

Decades of clinical experience and research in human and non-human primates demonstrate that maternal care received early in life strongly influences the development of parenting and other social skills as well as resiliency in the face of stress. Analogous intergenerational effects of maternal nurturing have recently been reported in rats. Adult stress responses (anxiety and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activation) are inversely related to the amount of maternal lickin...