Dr. Howard Smith Oncall

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/lYbltmFJsVg   Babies under the age of two show empathy for those who are victimized and expect that parents and teachers will intervene to put a stop to the bullying.  These related conclusions come from separate studies at the University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign and Israel’s Ben Gurion University.   The Israeli study shows that infants as young as 6 months can recognize a victim of bullying and show appropriate concern for that individual’s feelings and welfare.  The Illinois investigation demonstrates that, by 18 months of age, infants and toddlers understand social order, and they expect that the leaders of groups, their parents and teachers, will intervene to right any wrongs and int-group transgressions that have occurred.   Given these studies, it would seem that babies have more common sense than some of our politicians.  Time and again, our elected leaders bully their peers as well as the general public, and it seems that those in authority lack the sense or the courage