Inside story

Scientific research is shedding new light on the age-old debate – nature versus nurture – when it comes to baby’s personality, writes Craig Bishop

DIG FAR ENOUGH, they say, and inside every grown man or woman you’ll find a crying child, still processing deepseated traumas of their early life. Now it seems, we can go back even further, into the womb, to track the origins of what makes us tick.

Personality development is affected by the lifestyle options Mom chooses, such as diet, stress levels, leisure activities and levels of toxins. This means that genes may have less influence on character, and the environment of the womb more. Johns Hopkins University psychologist Janet DiPietro says that the old notion of nature influencing the foetus before birth and nurture after birth needs an update. “There’s an antenatal environment provided by the mother.”

Here’s a simple test. Choose a book and read it to baby in the womb. Say you’ve chosen The Gruffalo. Chances are once born, baby will prefer The Gruffalo to any other reading material.

The womb, it seems, isn’t the closedoff habitat once thought. Rather, it’s a permeable, two-way echo chamber that reveals tantalising new glimpses of intelligent life. Moreover, while birth is of course the crowning event of every mom’s journey through parenthood, neurologically speaking, it’s actually rather boring. Nothing much happens in baby’s mind at birth that hasn’t already happened in the womb. Research reveals that the real mental and “personality” action starts at around 32 weeks, a good two months before baby is ready for the outside world. At this stage, baby is behaving just like a newborn. This includes REM sleep patterns and the start of reacting to differing food tastes. Scientists speculate that baby is dreaming about what she experiences in the womb.

YOUR MOOD AFFECTS BABY

The latest research suggests that long before birth, a mother’s mood can determine foetal development. It’s something that moms have instinctively known forever, and you don’t have to go far to find mommy and psychology blogs converging online, discussing the extent to which Mom’s behaviour when pregnant affects the baby’s mental state. “Oh, she’s going to be a feisty one for sure,” a mom might say when baby kicks. Or, “Yuck, just the smell of meat makes me sick. Junior will definitely be a vegetarian!” These informal discussions seem to reflect what science has long observed. Long before Mom even knows she’s pregnant, Baby’s brain has begun to bulge, and by five weeks, Baby’s grey matter has started to form the complex patterns of an adult cerebral cortex.

Time magazine stated, “A pregnant women’s mental state can shape her offspring’s psyche.” The online journal Psychology Today has a fascinating story about a married couple, Tom and Carla, who sought psychological counselling in their struggle to fall pregnant. Carla duly fell pregnant with Peggy, and years later, when Peggy was an adult, the family returned to the same psychologist to work through some anxiety issues Peggy was having. It transpired that while Carla had been seven months pregnant, Tom had gone away on a two-week business trip. This had stressed Carla out, not least because their nightly routine of Tom putting his heartbeat over Carla’s tummy, saying a loving phrase, had been interrupted. Peggy had become restless, kicking endlessly. When Tom returned, the routine continued, and Peggy’s distress subsided. Years later, during counselling, when Tom repeated the loving phrases he had whispered to Peggy while she was in utero, this triggered a breakdown for Peggy, as she started to see her deepseated belief that she could never have a life separate from family, a belief that had been absorbed as a foetus.

NATURE OR NURTURE

Scientists are interested in exploring the extent to which these outside influences affect the internal hard-wiring of the brain. Research is being conducted on personality development being influenced by external factors, such as Mom’s moods, in what’s known as epigenetic modification (where environmental factors affect our genes but not our DNA).

In the womb, the right side of baby’s brain – which controls feelings, emotions and creativity (and ultimately personality) – develops more comprehensively than the left side, which controls language and logic. However, it’s not until baby is about two years old and starting to talk that the left side catches up and allows baby to translate all the right-side “feelings” into actual actions. And it’s these actions that we look at and call personality. But these feelings have been there all along, in the womb, suggesting that so too have the origins of personality.

EXPOSURE TO SUBSTANCES

There are also several personality and learning traits associated with children exposed to alcohol in the womb. Cape Town-based maternal and foetal medicine specialist Dr Lou Pistorius says personality is probably 45 to 50 percent inborn, 45 to 50 percent related to the position in the family (birth order) and 5 to 10 percent related to education. “It’s also known that substance abuse is linked to personality disorders. Whether this is due to the substance itself or the environment in which the child grows up is difficult to tease apart.”

While scientists continue to explore the fascinating world of the womb, take advantage of the huge benefits, both physiological and psychological, of interacting with your unborn baby.

WHY SHOULDN’T YOUR baby habitually breathe through the mouth? Your nose is designed to warm, moisten and filter the air that you breathe. Excessive mouth breathing can be problematic because air is not filtered and warmed as much as when it’s inhaled through the nose. This could possibly result in a wide range of respiratory and allergic conditions for your baby.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CORRECT BREATHING

Dr Douw van der Merwe is a dentist who is a passionate advocate of the benefits of correct breathing. He comments: “When someone breathes through their mouth, they breathe polluted air, with all its allergens, straight into the lungs without having this air filtered. The lungs of babies and children are especially sensitive and need to be protected.” He further points out that it’s important to breathe through the nose because as well as purifying polluted air, the nasal passages ensure that air reaches the lungs at the correct humidity and temperature. “In my practice, I see children with sinusitis, bronchitis and gingivitis, which appear to be directly related to mouth breathing. When I encourage these children to breathe through their noses, they appear to be far less prone to allergies and infections.”

HOW TO ENCOURAGE THE “NOSE BREATHING” HABIT

Dr van der Merwe is a keen advocate of orthodontic dummies. He says: “I am most impressed with the German orthodontic brand of dummies. I have been recommending NUK dummies to expectant mothers for many years.

I find that a NUK dummy fits snugly underneath the nose of a baby and seals off the mouth in such a way that correct suction is assisted and mouth breathing is prevented.” He advocates the use of an orthodontic dummy until the age of about three years.

If your child habitually breathes through his mouth, he needs to be examined by a dentist or a medical professional who can identify and treat the problem appropriately. It is Dr van der Merwe’s belief that the use of a dummy from early on in your baby’s life will assist correct breathing as it helps to create the habit of nose breathing.