CULTURAL DETERMINANTS OF BEHAVIOR 



1461 



sapiens, then, we may regard all living peo- 

 ples, however primitive their civilizations, 

 as one group, with allowance for the very 

 minor influence of such physical differences 

 among peoples as the degree of pendulous- 

 ness of women's breasts, or the amount 

 of male body hair. Whatever the culture. 

 Homo sapiens is characterized by a very 

 long period of infancy and by the extreme 

 helplessness of the young at birth. Unlike 

 the primates, a human infant is not able to 

 attach himself to the mother and, unlike 

 the other higher mammals, is not able to 

 move about or to seek food for himself. This 

 long period of dependence includes reliance 

 on the parent for warmth, among those peo- 

 ples whose knowledge of fire has enabled 

 them to live in cold climates, and for shelter, 

 where artificial shelter is a condition of life. 



The prolonged period of dependence on 

 the mother or mother surrogate for food, 

 drink, locomotion, and protection has very 

 definite implications for human develop- 

 ment. Early Freudian theory emphasized a 

 series of growth stages which are character- 

 ized by the zones, oral, anal, genital, which 

 are at the center of the child's developing 

 libido. Freud's early theory has been elabo- 

 rated in a form suitable for cross-cultural 

 use by Erikson (1950), who has delineated 

 the stages in a child's growth on a diagram 

 in which zones and modes appropriate to 

 zones can be systematically handled. The 

 designation of the mode, e.g., that of in- 

 corporation, or retention, makes it possible 

 to include other sensory modalities in the 

 discussion, in addition to the classical oral, 

 anal, and genital ones, listening is incorpora- 

 tive, grasping is associated with the second 

 oral stage of active incorporation, etc. This 

 systematic treatment can be combined with 

 Gesell-Ilg type of analysis by chronologic 

 age into a scheme which makes it possible 

 to compare culturally expected develop- 

 ment, for males and females, in different 

 cultures which select different develop- 

 mental stages for emphasis (Mead, 1948). 



Recent studies of institutionalized chil- 

 dren whose physical needs were adequately 

 met but who received no individualized 

 human "mothering" suggest that the human 

 organism needs such individualized care not 

 only for survival but also for development 

 of its a))ilities to learn to speak and to relate 



itself to other people (Bowlby, 1951). The 

 studies also suggest that during these peri- 

 ods there are stages or phases, critical peri- 

 ods in which deprivation has more drastic 

 effects than at others. There is strongly 

 suggestive evidence that during the stages 

 of actual physical dependency which pre- 

 cede walking, the two stages of dependent 

 lactation, certain types of learning occur, 

 more like "imprinting" (in birds) than 

 "conditioning," which have important con- 

 sequences in the subsequent functioning of 

 the individual as a human being (Tanner 

 and Inhelder, 1953; see Hampson and 

 Hampson, also). Until recent times, this 

 dependency included breast feeding, and 

 the only alternative to nursing by the real 

 mother was nursing by another lactating 

 woman. 



The point in evolution at which the 

 father was willing to take over the care of 

 the second child (the "knee baby") when 

 the mother became pregnant or after the 

 birth of the younger infant is not known. 

 In the primate societies for which we have 

 any record, the males show protective be- 

 havior if the young are in danger. Human 

 male care of females with young children 

 has included some provision of food as well 

 as protection in all societies of which we 

 have any record, in contrast with primate 

 societies in which the females and juveniles 

 must fend for themselves (Carpenter. 1934, 

 1940). 



Until the last decade it was possible to 

 ascribe the willingness of the male to par- 

 ticipate in his wife's pregnancy, delivery, 

 and lactation care of the child entirely to 

 learned behavior. However, experience dur- 

 ing the last decade in the United States, 

 when males have come to combine care of 

 very young infants with increasing enthusi- 

 asm in exercising such care, suggests that 

 there may be in human males a hitherto 

 hardly tapped instinctive response to very 

 young infants, which originally functioned 

 only to ensure protection but now functions 

 to ensure active participation. Previously, 

 without invoking any theory of instinctive 

 behavior, it was possible to account for the 

 participation of the father in observation 

 of pregnancy tal)oos, in the delivery, in 

 lactation taboos, in the care of the knee 



