The biopsychology of maternal behavior in nonhuman mammals

The term “maternal behavior,” when applied to nonhuman mammals, includes the behaviors exhibited in preparation for the arrival of newborn, in the care and protection of the newly arrived young, and in the weaning of those young, and represents a complex predictable pattern that is often regarded as a single, comprehensive, species-specific phenomenon. Although the delivering first-time mammalian mother is immediately and appropriately maternal, a maternal “virgin” with no prior exposure to young does not show immediate and appropriate behavior toward foster young. Nevertheless, the virgin female, and indeed the male, possess the neural circuitry that underlies the pattern referred to as maternal behavior, despite not exhibiting the pattern under normal circumstances. At parturition, or after extensive exposure to young, what emerges appears to be a single stereotyped maternal behavior pattern. However, it is actually a smoothly coordinated constellation of simpler actions with proximate causes that, when sequenced properly, have the appearance of a motivated, purposive, adaptive, pattern of caretaking. Over the past 50 years, much research has focused on finding the principal external and internal factors that convert the nonmaternal behavior patterns of the nonpregnant nullipara, the virgin, to the almost immediate and intense maternal behavior characteristic of the puerpera, the mother. This review is an attempt to summarize the many comprehensive, even encyclopedic, reviews of these factors, with an emphasis on brain mechanisms, and to highlight the gaps that remain in understanding the processes involved in the almost immediate onset of maternal caretaking behaviors observed in mammals at delivery. Where possible, the reader is directed to some of those excellent reviews

Name Strategy: Its Existence and Implications

It is argued that colour name strategy, object name strategy, and chunking strategy in memory are all aspects of the same general phenomena, called stereotyping, and this in turn is an example of a know-how representation. Such representations are argued to have their origin in a principle called the minimum duplication of resources. For most the subsequent discussions existence of colour name strategy suffices. It is pointed out that the Berlin†- Kay† universal partial ordering of colours and the frequency of traffic accidents classified by colour are surprisingly similar; a detailed analysis is not carried out as the specific colours recorded are not identical. Some consequences of the existence of a name strategy for the philosophy of language and mathematics are discussed: specifically it is argued that in accounts of truth and meaning it is necessary throughout to use real numbers as opposed to bi-valent quantities; and also that the concomitant label associated with sentences should not be of unconditional truth, but rather several real-valued quantities associated with visual communication. The implication of real-valued truth quantities is that the Continuum Hypothesis of pure mathematics is side-stepped, because real valued quantities occur ab initio. The existence of name strategy shows that thought/sememes and talk/phonemes can be separate, and this vindicates the assumption of thought occurring before talk used in psycho-linguistic speech production models.

Effects of Lateral Hypothalamic Lesions on Placentophagia in Virgin, Primiparous, and Multiparous Rats

Lesions of the lateral hypothalamus (LH) were produced in pregnant and nonpregnant female rats through chronically implanted electrodes to investigate the effect of LH damage on placentophagia. Other variables investigated were prior parturitional experience and stimulus properties of the placenta. Lesions were produced under ether anesthesia 24 hr. prior to parturition in pregnant females and 24 hr. prior to placenta presentation in nonpregnant females.\ud The LH lesions produced aphagia to a liquid diet. Pregnancy was not a significant variable in the initiation of placentophagia, but prior parturitional experience was a critical variable. Virgin and primiparous females did not exhibit placentophagia following LH damage, but multiparous females would eat placenta whenever the opportunity arose, independently of LH damage and pregnancy

INFORMATION, ENERGY, AND EVOLUTION

Within the current theory of evolution, the development in the direction of higher complexity is taken to be a necessary condition. This gives birth to a problem why this direction is prevalent for evolution. Philosophers and scientists tried to substantiate this condition and to explain it, yet the question still remains open. Our aim is to find specific regularities in nature that make complexity the chosen direction. Three main causes for this direction are deduced from initial principles, assuming that information and energy are the vital nutrients for evolution. Consequently, we base our explication and explanation of causes on the principles of information theory, Ashby’s principle of requisite variety/complexity, as well as we suggest and ground some additional principles of the system development. This makes possible to separate three principal stages for evolution of living organisms: biological, neurological, and epistemological

Ingested placenta blocks the effect of morphine on gut transit in Long–Evans rats

Opioids produce antinociception, and ingested placenta or amniotic fluid modifies that antinociception. More specifically, ingested placenta enhances the antinociception produced by selective activation of central n-opioid or y-opioid receptors but attenuates that produced by activation of central A-opioid receptors. Opioids also slow gut transit by acting on central or peripheral A-opioid receptors. Therefore, we hypothesized that ingested placenta would reverse the slowing of gut transit that is produced by morphine, a preferential A-opioid-receptor agonist. Rats were injected with morphine either centrally or systemically and fed placenta, after which gastrointestinal transit was evaluated. We report here that ingested placenta reversed the slowing of gut transit produced by centrally administered morphine but did not affect the slowing of gut transit produced by systemically administered morphine. These results suggest another likely consequence of placentophagia at parturition in mammals—reversal of opioid-mediated, pregnancy-based disruption of gastrointestinal function—as well as an important consideration in opioid-based treatments for pain in humans—enhancement of desirable effects with attenuation of adverse effects

Perinatal maternal and neonatal behaviour in\ud the captive reticulated giraffe

A captive reticulated giraffe was observed constantly for three weeks prior to, and periodically for 90 days subsequent to, the birth of her calf. Extensive observations were made of the birth sequence, feeding, drinking, sleeping and one instance of an infant distress call, as well as observations of the initiation of maternal behaviour (including licking, nursing, placentophagia, and what appeared to be helping the calf to stand, guiding the calf's movements, and attempts to respond to the calf's distress call)

Effects of Medial Preoptic Lesions on\ud Placentophagia and on the Onset of Maternal\ud Behavior in the Rat

Lesions of the medial preoptic area (MPO) were produced through permanently indwelling electrodes 24 hr prior to parturition in pregnant rats, or 24 hr prior to donor-placenta presentation in virgin rats determined in a pretest to be placentophages. The lesions had no disruptive effect on placentophagia in the virgin females. However, MPO lesions did delay the onset of placentophagia, pup-retrieval, and nestbuilding in some parturient rats. In others, lesions produced an impairment (in latency and quality) only of nest-building. None showed any impairment of pup-licking, or in the clear tendency to leave excreted waste away from the gathered pups. These results suggest the possibility of at least semi-independent mechanisms for the various components of maternal behavior

ORGANIC AGRICULTURE AND FOOD SECURITY

Modelling the impacts of organic production up-scaled to regional and global levels gives an initial quan-tification of the potential extent of changes that large-scale conversion might induce. Optimistic estimates of change with respect to organic yield potential lead to modest impacts on global commodity prices, production, and trade. Conversion in high-input regions in Europe and North America to certified organic decreases production and increases commodity prices. Hunger in this scenario slightly worsens. Transition of low-input areas in Sub-Saharan Africa to non-certified organic leads to in-creased production and decreased prices. Food secu-rity improves slightly in this scenario. The switch for low-input regions helps decrease trade dependency in some commodities. Achievement of productivity levels in these scenarios is dependent on many factors that introduce a significant amount of uncertainty in the results. The extent of these impacts can be improved if concerted effort in research and development for yield and productivity enhancement is supported

The effects of strain, reproductive condition, and strain of placenta donor on placentophagia in nonpregnant mice

The effects on placentophagia of strain, reproductive condition, and strain of placenta donor were observed in nonpregnant mice. Mice of the C57BL/6By and BALB/cBy strains were exposed to placentas of either strain after either no previous parturitional experience, one parturitional experience without nursing experience, or one parturitional experience with nursing experience. There was a significant effect of strain, a significant effect of reproductive condition, but no significant effect of strain of placenta donor. There was a significant interaction between strain and reproductive condition, but no significant interactions with placenta strain. It was inferred that the ability of a mouse to acquire and utilize relevant stimuli during and after parturition, in order to produce an emancipation of placentophagia from the physiological controls associated with parturition, is influenced by genotype

Placentophagia in Nonpregnant Rats:\ud Influence of Estrous Cycle Stage and Birthplace

Prior parturitional experience and genotype have previously been found to affect the proportion of nonpregnant female rats and mice that will eat foster placenta. The present series of experiments was designed to investigate the influence of estrous cycle stage on placentophagia in rats. Foster placenta was presented to nonpregnant Long-Evans females, purchased from a commercial breeder, for 15 min on 5 consecutive days. We found that virgin placentophages were most likely to have eaten placenta on the first presentation, unless the first presentation occurred during proestrus. In fact, virgins would not eat placenta for the first time during proestrus, regardless of test-day. However, once they had eaten placenta, either in a nonproestrus stage, or, in the case of primiparae, during parturition, they would eat placenta during proestrus. Long-Evans rats born in our laboratory differed from the purchased rats, manifesting an incidence of placentophagia that was too low to be analyzed by stage of the estrous cycle; when tested as primiparae, however, there were no differences between the two groups