ABSTRACT
The work that has been done upon the biology of the infant has shown the way in which, from the earliest days of infancy, the right brain regulates the body and responds to the external environment. It has become incontrovertible that the infant cannot regulate its own body without the help of the mother or care-taker. Empirical research observation has led Panksepp to suggest that an infant who is exposed to too much fear during the earliest development of the brain may develop a tendency in adult life to anxiety disorders or phobias. Around and above the right hemisphere of the brain develops the prefrontal cortex and cingulate, and, as it grows during the first three years of infancy, so does the capacity to speak, symbolize, think, and reflect upon the self and others. The capacity to remember and feel again the original trauma opened up the possibility of changing the abusive legacy of the nursery.
