Study: Infant rats can sense their mothers' fear using smell
A new study at the University of Michigan Medical School found that infants may be able to detect their mothers' fear — through smell.
The study, published in the journal Proceedings in the National Academy of Sciences, suggests that infants, or at least infant rats, recognize their mothers' feelings of being threatened by identifying certain smells.
"Our research demonstrates that infants can learn from maternal expression of fear, very early in life," lead researcher Jacek Debiec told Business Standard. "Most importantly, these maternally-transmitted memories are long-lived, whereas other types of infant learning, if not repeated, rapidly perish."
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The researchers studied rats that they taught to fear the smell of peppermint by "exposing them to mild, unpleasant electric shocks" before they were pregnant, according to Business Standard. The mother rats then passed the fear along to their offspring as they acted distressed at the smell.
Debiec told Business Standard that the study's findings may help "prevent children from learning irrational or harmful fear responses from their mothers."
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Meghan DeMaria is a staff writer at TheWeek.com. She has previously worked for USA Today and Marie Claire.
-
Dark energy data suggest Einstein was right
Speed Read Albert Einstein's 1915 theory of general relativity has been proven correct, according to data collected by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
New DNA tests of Pompeii dead upend popular stories
Speed Read An analysis of skeletal remains reveals that some Mount Vesuvius victims have been wrongly identified
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
NASA's Europa Clipper blasts off, seeking an ocean
Speed Read The ship is headed toward Jupiter on a yearslong journey
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Detailed map of fly's brain holds clues to human mind
Speed Read This remarkable fruit fly brain analysis will aid in future human brain research
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Blind people will listen to next week's total eclipse
Speed Read While they can't see the event, they can hear it with a device that translates the sky's brightness into music
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Melting polar ice is messing with global timekeeping
Speed Read Ice loss caused by climate change is slowing the Earth's rotation
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
An amphibian that produces milk?
speed read Caecilians, worm-like amphibians that live underground, produce a milk-like substance for their hatchlings
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Jupiter's Europa has less oxygen than hoped
speed read Scientists say this makes it less likely that Jupiter's moon harbors life
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published