3 Infant Brain Development and Parent Caregiver Relationships

Infant Brain Development and Parent/Caregiver Relationships

In the best circumstances, infants are born with everything in place – ten little fingers and toes, a beating heart, and lungs that breathe. While infants’ physical appearance seems to be completely assembled, the infant’s brain undergoes a considerable amount of critical growth and development over the first few years. Early experiences spark neurological synapses, or connections in the brain, which influence the physical wiring of infants’ brains. Infants are completely dependent on their caregivers to meet their basic needs of survival. When parent/caregivers tune into their infants signals and respond accordingly, infants develop a sense that people and the world are safe and trustworthy. Conversely, when caregiving patterns are unpredictable or fail to meet infants’ needs, infants grow up feeling anxious and untrusting.

Brain development begins while infants are developing in their mother’s womb. This period of rapid development continues during the first few years of life. During the prenatal period, everything the mother puts into her body (e.g. drugs, appropriate nutrition, etc) potentially affects infants’ developing brain.

A mother’s influence does not end at birth, but continues through the multitude of interactions the baby has with her and other caregivers, who also significantly influence infant development. Developmentally appropriate interactions and experiences infants have with their parent/caregivers increases the quantity and quality of strong neurological connections made in the infants developing brain. These neurological connections, consistently reinforced by the parent/caregivers responsiveness and sensitivity to infants’ cues and signals, enhances infants’ capacity to process increasingly more complex sensory stimuli, further expanding brain development. These neurological connections facilitate physical movement, cognitive growth, language development, and social and emotional development. Conversely, when a young child’s cues and signals are not responded to, their brains are given less opportunity to develop. This increases the likelihood of seeing delays in development.

More brain growth and learning occurs during infancy than any other time in life. Newborns’ brains increase in size at a rapid rate. Infants are born with approximately 100 billion neurons. The number of synapses in newborns' brains increases from 50 trillion to one quadrillion in the first month of life. If an infant’s body grew at a comparable rate, his weight would increase from 8.5lbs at birth to 170lbs at one-month-old.[3] The images on the next page are pictures of an infant’s brain growth.

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