For babies who have not been able to move, crying is the only way for them to express their needs. Whether they are thirsty, hungry, cold, or hot, they will use crying to call for care of adults.
But sometimes, even if the child’s needs are met, the child will still cry non-stop. At this time, experienced parents will pick up the child and walk around. After a while, the child will stop crying.
So what is going on?
Why do babies cry?
Want to understand, why does the baby stop crying after picking up the baby? We need to know first, why does the baby cry?
Compared with other animal cubs, you will find that many animal cubs are very quiet. Even if they cry occasionally, they will stop crying after their needs are met. There are even many animals that learn to walk shortly after they are born, such as ponies and lambs.
One very important reason why human babies often cry is that humans are all premature babies. We know that humans have learned to walk continuously upright as early as the earth ape period. In order to ensure the stability of upright walking, the width of human pelvis is narrowed, otherwise humans will walk and shake when walking upright like gorillas.
On the other hand, the australopithecus has already started to feed on meat, and the energy contained in meat food is very high, giving humans enough energy to develop brain capacity. In this way, the human brain gradually began to expand. When the increasing brain capacity encounters the gradually narrowing pelvis, it is easy for humans to give birth to offspring. Fortunately, humans have evolved early birth to solve this problem.
Because babies don’t develop in their mothers for long enough, human babies have zero survival skills at birth. They need to rely on their parents for everything they do, including eating, keeping warm, and defecation. At this time, babies don’t use words yet, so they cry to get the attention of their parents.
Although cats and puppies are unable to take care of themselves for a period of time, they will use crying to call their mothers, but they are not in this stage for a long time, and it will take a few weeks for the puppies to be able to survive and cry. It will reduce a lot.
Why doesn’t the baby cry after being picked up?
Studies have found that the reason why babies don’t cry after being picked up is because humans have been under pressure to survive for a long time.
In ancient times, the living environment of mankind was not safe. For example: in the time of the earth apes, humans at this time still had natural enemies: fear cats, they would hunt down the earth apes and feed on the earth apes.
In the process of human evolution, although humans are gradually strengthening their weapons, they are still fierce and unlucky in the face of large beasts, and they have always lived under the pressure of large beasts. During this period, humans did not develop agriculture. They needed to run around in order to find food. In the process of running, if the child made a louder noise, it would attract the attention of the nearby beasts and increase the mortality rate of mother and child.
Under this pressure of survival, the children who were still crying when the mother moved the child were eliminated by natural selection. Only the offspring who kept quiet during the movement of the child were left, and their genes were passed on. Go on, so that even though our living environment is safe enough, but the baby still retains “ancient memory”.
It is precisely because of this that when the baby keeps crying, the mother can quiet the baby by holding it.
In fact, it’s not just humans. This phenomenon is very common in nature. For example, although the lion is majestic, when the lioness moves the cub, the cub will not make any noise. Although cats are domineering, kittens don’t dare to make noises when their mothers move them; dogs look silly, but they are not stupid.
It can be seen that animals in nature are faced with certain survival pressures, and under this pressure, different animals have evolved the same solutions.
to sum up
Although the living environment of human beings today is very different from that of ancient times, we still have memories of ancient times. This is most common in babies. For example, they have amazing grip strength and can hold each other tightly. Let yourself be lifted with both hands. And when crying, you will stop crying after being picked up.
Of course, the current living environment is relatively safe, so that some children who still cry after being picked up can survive, so there are also a small number of babies who are still crying even if they are picked up.
