The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy: Healing the Social Brain (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology)

by Louis Cozolino

While more maternal attention results in increased growth and enhanced functioning throughout the pups’ brains, separation from mothers proves to have the opposite effects. The same three areas that are upregulated with more maternal attention are all downregulated by her absence. Deprivation of maternal attention increases neural and glial death, while reducing gene expression, impairing their ability to learn. Maternal separation also results in reduced inhibitory (GABA) receptors in the locus coeruleus, increasing adrenaline secretion in reaction to stress while reducing the antianxiety properties of benzodiazepine receptors in the amygdala. Decreased cortisol receptors in the hippocampus also impair the inhibitory feedback to the stress system to shut down cortisol production.