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alexandra_k said:
then he wondered just how strong this love bond was with the cloth cuddly monkeys...

so he make it so the cloth cuddly monkeys would hurt the infants. he put sharp metal spikes on them that would jab the infants when the infants tried to cuddle the cloth monkey. he made the cloth cuddly monkey emit a blast of pressurised water that would throw the monkey back against the bars of the cage. the monkeys would... keep going back to cuddle the cloth monkeys despite such abuse.

so we learned that infants who are severely physically abused still have strong attachment behaviour (love) for their abusers.

the monkeys who were raised in isolation from their peers never developed normal social skills once they were reunited with their peers. he wanted to mate the females to see whether they were capable of mothering infant monkeys well and to see whether the infant monkeys would develop normal social skills. the monkeys who were raised in isolation from their peers would bite and attack male monkeys who wanted to mate with them, however. they didn't seem to understand the social cues of 'want to mate' compared with 'want to fight'. so... he devised a 'rape rack' (that was his chosen terminology). basically... he made this rack that would physically restrain the females so the males could mate with them. he found that they were unable to mother their infants well. often they tried to kill them and / or they hurt or rejected them.

so we learned that abused mothers tend to not know what to do with their infants which tends to result in their being abusive to them in turn.

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Of course, I am one of those monkeys. One whose mother was deprived of sufficient love, and, because of that failed at love when it came time for her to marry and parent, and then, not knowing why she did it, turned her rage against those who failed her upon her children (including me). That is, that's who I was as an infant. Now I am grown, and remain damaged.

What do I do about it? Try to understand it. There is a limited amount of help from our society in doing that -- because so many monkeys are significantly damaged -- and are virtually unaware of it, because it is so common.

I am working on it.