Babies Know The Difference between Good and Evil at Six Months : a Study reveals

At the age of six months babies can barely sit up - let along take their first tottering steps, crawl or talk. But, according to psychologists, they have already developed a sense of moral code - and can tell the difference between good and evil.

An astonishing series of experiments is challenging the views of many psychologists and social scientists that human beings are born as 'blank slates' - and that our morality is shaped by our parents and experiences.

Instead, they suggest that the difference between good and bad may be hardwired into the brain at birth.

In one experiment involving puppets, babies aged six months old showed a strong preference to 'good' helpful characters - and rejected unhelpful, 'naughty' ones.

In another, they even acted as judge and jury. When asked to take away treats from a 'naughty' puppet, some babies went further - and dished out their own punishment with a smack on its head.

Professor Paul Bloom, a psychologist at Yale University in Connecticut, whose department has studied morality in babies for years, said: 'A growing body of evidence suggests that humans do have a rudimentary moral sense from the very start of life.

'With the help of well designed experiments, you can see glimmers of moral thought, moral judgment and moral feeling even in the first year of life.

'Some sense of good and evil seems to be bred in the bones.'

For one study, the Yale researchers got babies aged between six months and a year to watch a puppet show in which a simple, colourful wooden shape with eyes tries to climb a hill.

Sometimes the shape is helped up the hill by a second toy, while other times a third character pushes it down.

After watching the show several times, the babies were shown the helpful and unhelpful toys. They showed a clear preference for the helpful toys - spending far longer looking at the 'good' shapes than the 'bad' ones.

'In the end, we found that six- and ten-month-old infants overwhelmingly preferred the helpful individual to the hindering individual,' Prof Bloom told the New York Times.

'This wasn't a subtle statistical trend; just about all the babies reached for the good guy.'

Two more tests found the same moral sense.

In one, the researchers devised a 'one-act morality play', in which a toy dog tries to open a box. The dog is joined by a teddy bear who helps him lift the lid, and a teddy who stubbornly sits on the box.

They also made the babies watch a puppet cat play ball with two toy rabbits. When the cat rolled the ball to one rabbit, it rolled the ball straight back. But when the cat rolled it to the second rabbit, it picked up the ball and ran off.

'In both studies, five-month-old babies preferred the good guy - the one who helped to open the box; the one who rolled the ball back - to the bad guy,' said Professor Bloom.

When the same tests were repeated with 21-month-old babies, they were given a chance to dish out treats to the toys - or take treats away.

Most toddlers punished the 'naughty rabbit' by taking away treats. One even gave the miscreant a smack on the head as a punishment.

Although the studies appear to show that mortality is hard-wired into babies brains, some psychologists urged caution.

Dr Nadja Reissland, of Durham University, said babies started to learn the difference between good and bad from birth.

'Everything hinges on who decides what is normal,' she said. 'By saying pushing the ball up the hill is helpful, the researchers are making a moral judgement. The babies might just prefer to see things go up rather than down.

'In the other test, perhaps the bear closes the box to prevent the dog from getting in there because there is something dangerous inside. It is like a mother keeping children out of an area where there is something harmful.'

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4 Recomended Summer Outdoor Acitivities for kids

When summer holidays come around and it's the weekend there are hours and hours to kill. It can be hard to think of things to fill those hours, especially when small children have such a short attention span. Here are four simple, yet engaging ideas for activities to take part in with your kids...

Gardening

This may be something that a lot of us don't get into until middle age, but you'd be surprised how good children as young as three or four can be at gardening. Start off with something simple, but also something that gives great results. Lettuce, for example, is very easy to plant and it grows quickly so your kids will stay interested. Teach them that placing seeds in a covered pot with damp tissue and placed on a warm windowsill will make them sprout quickly. Then teach them how to transfer them to soil carefully and when it's grown, eat it for lunch!

Make an Insect Zoo

Perhaps skip this one if you're scared of creepy crawlies. Showing your fear to children at a young age could pass it onto them, so leave this to friends or your partner!

Building your own worm farm could become a project for the whole summer. It'll teach the nippers a bit of woodwork, but also biology and how to be more economical in the home, if you use it to get rid of kitchen waste.

Also, try collecting chrysalises and keeping them in a safe container until they grow into butterflies. Many places actually sell netted tubes designed for keeping insects like butterflies and grasshoppers. Ask your kids to give them names, help clean them out, draw them each week and take note of their size.

Go Exploring

For children, the realms of reality and imagination are very much interlinked, and there's no harm in diving into their world of fantasy every now and then. Go bear hunting in the woods with jars of honey to lure them in, or spend the day at the bottom of the garden with nets, looking for fairies to catch. Perhaps the nicest thing to do with very little kids is take them to the park with a picnic and their favourite teddies. Sing the song and tell them stories about teddies when you get there and then let them run around in the playground while you soak up the sun.

Make a Water Slide

Last but not least, kids in the summer love to play with water. In fact, they love it all year round, but when it's hot and the day is long, spraying on some sun lotion and letting them cool down outside in their swimsuits is one of the most fun things you can do.

If you have a long stretch of grass in your garden, and you can get hold of a long piece of tarpaulin then lay it on the ground. You could secure it with tent pegs if it has holes but make sure before anyone slides down it that the pegs are deep in the ground and not popping up where a stray toe or finger could get caught. Next, pour a bit of bubble bath all the way down the tarpaulin, rubbing it in so it covers the whole thing. That way when you get the hose and point it so it's spraying downwards it'll become extra slippery. If you're on a slope, even better. What happens next I think you know... just take a slow run up and slide!

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Baby Diarrhea Treatment

A mild diarrhea seen in babies can be treated safely at home. The best way is to provide lots of fluids to your baby to prevent dehydration. It is also suggested to stop giving any milk or solids to the baby for a minimum of 24 hours, and gradually introduce a normal diet in the following days.

On the first day, you can start with giving glucose solution by mixing two teaspoons of glucose in one cup of boiled water. Apart from glucose there are also other salts that should be given with water. These days there are also electrolytes that are available at medical counters without any prescription. These are called as oral re-hydration solutions (ORS) and can be prepared by adding it to boiled water.

If you are breastfeeding the baby and the baby is having suffering from gastroenteritis, you should not feed the baby for 24 hours and give the baby the ORS. On the successive days you should reduce the amount of ORS and put the baby back on breast milk. If you have already weaned the baby then do not give any dairy products to the baby for the next five days. However, you should keep the infant on glucose and electrolytes.

Diarrhea is one of the major causes of death in small children. The oral re-hydration therapy is one of the best options for management of diarrhea. The oral re-hydration syrup can be made at home by adding a spoon of sugar and a pinch of salt to a quarter of water. But, make sure that the salt added is appropriate as adding excess salt can cause a problem.

The regular diet and the top milk should be stopped whenever the baby has diarrhea but breast milk should be continued until possible, as it has anti-infective properties. In severe cases of diarrhea, infant should only be fed with rip banana and pomegranate or apple juice can be given in small quantities at regular intervals. When the condition improves you can start with food made of rice, sago or arrowroot. You can also add powdered ginger or cumin seeds to spice it up. Also, give the baby soup of pulses, lean meat and butter milk. Once the stools become semisolid you can start giving curd, soft rice and diluted milk. With further improvement you can start with the regular diet gradually.

It is seen that milk intolerance can occur in a number of cases of acute diarrhea. If the child has milk intolerance then you should avoid giving any products based on milk products for at least 2 to 3 days. When you start giving milk in such cases, start with small dilute quantities in order to keep the load on the intestine low. It is important to understand that you should not restrict the child from regular food for a long time. You can start a normal diet after 4 to 5 days.

If the case of diarrhea becomes severe then you should take advice from the doctor. To prevent cases of diarrhea it is important that you should take all precautions and maintain proper hygiene.

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Housewife or Carriers Woman?

As a mother we are often faced the two choices between become housewives for the family or a career woman for self-actualization. Whatever your choice, all have advantages and disadvantages that you should consider carefully. For mommies who are still confused determining of choice, following several reasons that may be useful for you in making decisions

9 Reasons for Selecting Being Housewife

The requirement to stop working from familie
Having a very flexible time for family
Children need the presence of her mother's house

Not like the job
Husband's revenue has sufficient
Places of work away from home, feeling tired and costs are equal to the salary

Not like tied or set-set of others
Conditions the child that is not possible handed to another person. For example, child is sick or sickly-contract certain diseases.
For health reasons alone, because the responsibility of the job responsibilities as well as households who need health fit.

9 Reasons for Choosing a Career Woman

Education levels, unfortunately if not used.
Parents want you to work.
Husband's revenues has not sufficient
Work is self-actualization and socialization
Have financial freedom, should not depend entirely on the husband.
To support the needs of their own, for example, ask for help from the family without a husband.
Working to make you feel valued.Children's and husband's pride if you work.
Working to increase the insight, which will ultimately improve the quality of care patterns of children

Between the 2 options above, where the most part with the condition
Mommies at this time? The rest, discussed this issue with the pair before making a decision, so there is no regret in the future.

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Why Should You Consider Breastfeeding ??

Breastfeeding our baby is a choice and all mother's have to decide one way or the other. It is a way to be sure our baby best the best start in life that he or she can get. As you know, there are many factors that may go into breastfeeding. The following are six reasons why you should consider breastfeeding.

1. Protect Baby from Disease

Breast milk will provide your newborn with immunities that he or she can't get elsewhere. Many infant and childhood illnesses are reduced or eliminated through the immunities from breast milk. Some of the common ones are diabetes, allergies, asthma, Crohn's disease and even sudden infant death syndrome.

2. God's Designed Food

Breast milk provides babies with the the most perfect nutrition. The unique combination of carbohydrates, antibodies, proteins, as well as the minerals and fats, will provide your baby the very things they need to grow strong during these first months of their life.

Infant formula can never duplicate the perfect combinations in breast milk. Many of the antibodies that are passed through to your baby through breast milk are very specialized to your genetic background and environment. Of course , babies are able to digest breast milk much easier than infant formulas, no matter what all the big formula companies say. Many times infant formula is based on Cow's milk and this can irritate a newborn's intestinal tract.

3. Helps the New Mother get Her Body Back

When a new mom decides to breast feed, her body will go into milk production mode. It requires a lot of calories to make breast milk, some say up to 500 calories a day. This help the mom lose some of the weight she gained during pregnancy. Breastfeeding also causes the body to produce a different hormone that actually "shrinks" the uterus back to it's normal position a size.

4. Reduce Baby Costs - Save Money!

Breast milk is free. Infant formula is expensive! You can use all the money you save on the new baby. You can save so much money just by buying a breast pump and storing your extra milk to use when you can't breast feed directly. Be sure to buy a good Breast Pump. You can find them at great prices on the internet.

5. Bonds Mom and Baby

Breastfeeding causes a close bond to form between mom and baby. This is more than just the time spent close together, this is actally a horomonal change in mom while she is nursing. A horomone called 'prolactin' is released as a mother breast feeds and this has been known to cause a relaxing effect on the mom. This whole experience is what develops this bond between the baby and mom that lasts a lifetime.

6. Breast Feeding is Highly Recommended

Many organizations strongly encourage and promote breast feeding as the 'gold standard' for a healthy baby. Some of the big named organizations are the American Academy of Pediatrics, the World Health Organization, UNICEF and the American Dietetic Association.

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Fish Make A Child Clever

If pregnant woman is thirsted for a clever child, it is better to consider to make fish as a part of her diet during pregnancy. It is because fish can enhance the child think and motoric abilites.

A research published by American Journal of Epidemiology has put a test on the relationship between women consumption during pregnancy and cognitive result of three-ages children. The research showed that the women who consumed fish during her pregnancy had babies which had better motoric and cognitive abilites than the women who had not.

Three-ages children who are birth from mothers consuming at least two portion of fish every week show higher-than-level score on a test of vocabulary, visual-spacial, visual motor and skill-motoric.

According to David Neubauer MD, a researcher from John Hopkins University, the result is significance because pregnancy is the most important time for the development of baby's brain. Most of human nerve is formed when the pregnancy time is at six month. It is the time to form the the connection between the nerve cells.

"It is because fish contains of rich OMEGA III fat acid. The acid is known as an important component of brain structure," said Neubauer. The most riched OMEGA 3 fishes are salmon and hering.

However, Neubauer warns that not all kinds of fish consumption are benefit for the baby. it is because the fish that contaminates with dangerous substance such as mercury can also endanger the baby.

It is owing to the fact that a three-ages child who is birth from a mother consuming mercury-contaminated fish during pregnancy time tends to to have lower score in the test. The long-age big fishes such as tuna and swordfish, or the fish-eating fishes, they will accumulate mercury in their body. So both of them tend to have higher toxic level. The lower ones are such as shrimp, sardine, and salmon.

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