The Study of Fetal Psychology and Behavior

An essay talking about fetal awareness, behavior, and bond-ship with the mother.

A woman’s womb is a private and mysterious cocoon, a place shared from a mother to her offspring.  To some men and women it may seem like an automatic process, a way of producing a new life. To some others it’s something short of mere inconvenience and nowhere close to a “miracle”. Regardless of the modern science and technology we have today to help us understand what goes on inside this strange part of humanity’s life point, people still believe that a baby is only active once it is out into the world. In reality there is so much happening we just can’t see with our eyes alone. In only a brief span of years, science and technology has unlocked secrets and discoveries of a baby’s nine-month journey that could change perspectives and inspire us to formulate a new viewpoint about both unborn and newborn fetuses.  However, the old view that unborn babies have always been inactive and nothing short of insignificant growing clump of human cells has been replaced with the view that sensory and psychological development of an unborn fetus is rapid and full of constant activity and reaction. This all points to the notion that babies yet to be born are learning, listening, and interacting. 

With the help of ultrasound technology, psychology institutions have been watching and observing many interactions in fetal behavior. An ultrasound observes more than one kind of interaction other than just the movements.

“Ultrasound imaging of the human fetus is not restricted to movement or behavioral profiling. It can be adapted for other uses that lend themselves to the study of the brain.” (Emory, page 122).

This is one of the ways psychologists have been observing the behavior of fetal emotion, intuition, and even communication with the mother. Another way scientists observe fetal behavior is looking at facial expressions, body changes, and the way the fetus interacts with subtle or drastic change either to the womb or to itself. 
The earliest stage and confusing stage is when the child is an embryo. This stage is most critical in cognitive and physical development. At around 26 days after fertilization, scientists can see that the embryo has already started to form all of the organs it will need to survive after birth, just under-developed.

“The embryo’s first movements, which can be seen using very sensitive ultra-sound equipment, are not complex or coordinated, but the first twitches of life are well under way”(Bradford, page 36).

So much activity in one little bundle is still being examined in more depth by many psychological institutions. 

Scientists have noted that the earliest record of fetal behavior starts early as seven-to-eight weeks old, where a baby can be startled as well as produce hiccups. The most active behavior that a fetus engages in is the practice of “breathing”, tasting, and touching.  Looking more into such actions, they have discovered that the fetus can also practice hearing and responding to sound as well as feel reactions from the mother by what she may hear at the moment. The fetus will show full responses to sound at 22-24 weeks, at the latest.  

“Initially, responses are found only in the low-frequency range (250�"500Hz) of adult hearing (20�"20000Hz), but this range expands as the fetus matures” (Hepper).

Dreams have also been recorded to be active within a fetus’s mind while it is inside the womb.

“REM sleep encourages a fetus’s brain to develop, which may be why it spends about sixty percent of its last three months in the womb with this state” (Bradford, page 102).

It’s observed that babies will dream about things they have been doing, such as touch, taste, breathing, all the like. This is followed through facial expression and body movement that registers with fear, curiosity, or even disgust. It’s also a possibility that due to the telepathic bond between mother and offspring, the fetus can also sense when the mother is having dreams of her own and can experience part of her emotions due to those dreams. 

While there may be ideas that the unborn can feel pain, psychologists also have reason to believe that fetuses can experience stress along with the mother. Nikki Bradford, a professional talks about how mothers and her children can share a bond that will effect both or the other in many ways in terms of stress.

“As to whether fetuses are sufficiently well developed to experience what we understand as ‘stress’, British expert Dr. Alan Watkins says, ‘Stress exists independently of the cortex, the thinking part of the brain.’ “(Bradford, page 62-63).

Since there is no conscious thought process in the brain where stress thrives, this means that it is possible for stress to be transmitted to a fetus at a very early age of growth while the brain is still developing. (Bradford, page 62-63) This is the reason why doctors and psychologists suggest that the mother takes extra care of her body and mentality in order to support her offspring, because whatever affects the mother’s stress level will also affect the child. 


When babies are born into the world for the first time, professionals have noticed that babies will have what scientists call “prenatal preference”.

“Newborns prefer their mother’s voice to that of an unfamiliar female…a preference that is acquired prenatally. Newborns prefer music they have heard prenatally to that which they have never heard…” (Hepper).

This suggests that fetal babies will acquire a certain taste, sound, and tune that they have experienced while in the womb, forming an emotional bond as well to those certain characteristics at the time. 

To certain individuals who are expecting, planning to have a child, or are looking into a medical career with children, there are many reasons to why fetal behavior study is important to know and research. Many mothers and fathers are curious and uneducated about what happens during the growth process and require more information on what they can do to benefit their child in a more substantial way. There are doctors who want to study more about fetal disease or mentality disorders that could spawn at early stages of human development in the womb.  It helps a lot for couples and doctors to understand the mature process of the human fetus along with the body growth. There is clearly more research and data requested and needed to further examine fetal features for medical reasoning and even help a child in need before they are even born.  Early fetal behavior lets us know there is more activity and survival practice going on that the fetus goes through in order to prepare itself for birth.

“We’ve come a long way from regarding a fetus as what the French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau once brutally described as a witless tadpole” (Bradford, page 60).

Author's Note

Work Citations:

Hepper, Peter. (2005): n. page. Print. <[link]>.
Nikki Bradford, The Miraculous World of Your Unborn Baby: a week-by-week guide to your pregnancy. 2010. Print.
Emory, E. K. (2010). A womb with a view: ultrasound for evaluation of fetal neurobehavioral
Development. Infant & Child Development, 19(1), 119-124. doi:10.1002/icd.660

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[A. Amos]

This was informational and thank you for sharing...