Measuring nurture: Study shows how 'good mothering' hardwires infant brain

By carefully watching nearly a hundred hours of video showing mother rats protecting, warming, and feeding their young pups, and then matching up what they saw to real-time electrical readings from the pups' brains, researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center have found that the mother's presence and social interactions—her nurturing role—directly molds the early neural activity and growth of her offsprings' brain.