Who is Seymour Levine?

Fall, 2000

Levine has just published his newest paper on the minutia of neurochemical imbalance induced through early social disruptions and/or maternal stress in squirrel monkeys.

In this paper, Influence of psychological variables on the activity of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (European Journal of Pharmacology, 2000, September 29), Levine continues to document the long-term, sometimes life-long, metabolic vulnerability of infants who experience early emotional distress.

Levine writes, "The interaction of the developing rodent or primate with their primary care giver has permanent long-term effects on the HPA axis. Manipulations that alter maternal behavior during critical periods of development permanently modify the HPA axis. The HPA axis can be programmed to be hypo-responsive or hyper-responsive as a function of time and length of maternal separation. In the adult organism, the HPA response to stress is highly dependent on specific psychological factors such as control, predictability, and feedback. In primates, social variables have been shown to diminish or exacerbate the HPA stress response."

A sampling of Levine's publishing history shows that he has spent a lifetime hurting baby animals and cashing in on the public's confused notion of research and our gullible belief that important knowledge always results from any macabre sacrifice of animals. In Levine's defense it must be noted that much of society holds the baseless belief that all scientific experimentation is good, ethical, productive scientific research. Some portion of this confused public is likely to, themselves, become practitioners of this system; they believe in it. We must pray, in order to maintain respect or hope for our culture and species, that Levine is a victim of the system that validates and rewards repetitive and meaningless cruelty when it poses in white coats.

But Levine is guilty of a pedantic faith in the value of his research; a position that flies in the face of the scientific method, and one that would be scorned in most branches of real, as opposed to pseudo-science. Levine was interviewed by the Pulitzer prize winning news writer, Deborah Blum, in preparation for her award winning Monkey Wars. The interview, in the Fall 1992 Research Reporter (Vol. 22 No.2) is illustrative of the mindset of primate vivisectors in general.

Blum wrote: "A few scientists were almost astonishingly open . . . Seymour Levine, a Stanford University biologist and a favorite target of the animal rights movement, was equally prompt in agreeing to talk. Levine works in the controversial area of maternal deprivation, separating infant monkeys from their mothers. He has been picketed, leafleted and hung in effigy for almost a decade. But he spent hours with me, talking about his work, taking me to see his squirrel monkeys, determined, he said, not to let anyone devalue his studies."

But the "devaluation" of Levine's studies is shown by the absence of benefit to others stemming from his life's work. Levine is cited commonly in studies that repeat the demonstration that animals can be permanently damaged when distressed at an early age, but the frequency of such citations falls precipitously in literature dealing with human children.

By 1968, Levine had risen to the top of the "psychobiology of development" food chain. The psychobiology of development, as an animal-based research endeavor, often focuses on the long-term results of harming infants. Levine co-edited the extensive text, Early Experience and Behavior, in 1968. (Levine and Newton, Thomas Books, Springfield, Illinois. 18 chapters, multiple contributors, 718 pages).

Levine's early work focused on harming rat pups in various ways and then documenting the psychobiological effects of that harm. Writing in Early Experience and Behavior, Levine explained a component of his work at that time, "At forty-six days of age, half of the rats in each group received electroconvulsive shock. Twenty-four hours later, blood samples were obtained from all animals and glucose concentration was measured," ("Hormones in Infancy," in Early Experience and Behavior, page 174).

He began "Hormones in Infancy" with the explanation of work he had conducted in 1956, "Early research (Levine et al., 1956) on infantile experience dealt with rats treated in infancy either by simply picking them up once daily and placing them in a different environment for three minutes, or by giving them three minutes of electric shock daily until they were weaned at twenty-one days." ("Hormones in Infancy," in Early Experience and Behavior, page 168).

In 1978 he published "Prolonged cortisol elevation in the infant squirrel monkey after reunion with mother." (Physiology and Behavior, 1978, Jan) which he co-authored with Chris Coe, now director of the infamous Harlow Primate Psychology Lab in Madison, Wisconsin. Levine has been a frequent collaborator of Coe's.

A short list of papers Levine either authored or co-authored serve as mile posts along a wasted career:

· Mother-infant attachment in the squirrel monkey: adrenal response to separation. (Behavioral Biology, 1978, Feb)

· Separation distress and attachment in surrogate-reared squirrel monkeys. (Physiology and Behavior, 1979, Dec)

· Behavioral and pituitary--adrenal responses during a prolonged separation period in infant rhesus macaques. (Psychoneuroendocrinology, 1981)

· Hormonal responses accompanying fear and agitation in the squirrel monkey. (Physiology and Behavior, 1982, Dec)

· Social and environmental factors influencing mother-infant separation-reunion in squirrel monkeys. (Physiology and Behavior, 1985, Apr)

· Effect of maternal separation on the complement system and antibody responses in infant primates. (International Journal of Neuroscience, 1988 Jun)

· Behavioral and physiological responses to maternal separation in squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus). (Behavior and Neuroscience, 1990, Feb)

· Behavioral and physiological responses of mother and infant squirrel monkeys to fearful stimuli. (Developmental Psychobiology, 1992, Mar)

· Early experience effects on the development of fear in the squirrel monkey. (Behavioral and Neural Biology, 1993, Nov)

· Separation induced changes in squirrel monkey hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal physiology resemble aspects of hypercortisolism in humans. (Psychoneuroendocrinology, 1999, Feb)

In 1997, in a grant associated with his work at the University of Delaware on rat pups, Grant: 5 R37MH045006; MATERNAL REGULATION OF INFANT PHYSIOLOGY AND BEHAVIOR, Levine received $270,501 from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In 1996 he received $260,098 from this grant, in 1995 he received $250,342, and in 1994, $247,045. In 1991, $228,958. The grant was funded from 1989 to 1998.

Grant: 5K05MH19936, HORMONES AND BEHAVIOR, was begun in 1979 and was funded through 1994. In 1992 Levine received $104,085 from this grant. In 1993, $104,085, and in 1994, $105,867. He explained the study, "The proposal has four specific aims: 1) To examine which components of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal system (HPA) are modified by maternal deprivation. GCs, ACTH, CRFm and glucocorticoid receptors will be studied during the 24 hour period of maternal deprivation. 2) To examine which aspect of maternal behavior is responsible for inhibiting the HPA system in the rat pup. 3) To examine whether perinatal maternal deprivation influences the subsequent activity of the HPA system and behavior during the pre- and post-weaning period. 4) To examine whether perinatal maternal deprivation alters neuroendocrine activity and behavior in adulthood."

Previously, in 1986, he had explained another branch of research being funded under this same grant, "The proposed research extends our efforts in the following areas of primate developmental psychobiology: (1) The behavioral/hormonal consequences of different separation conditions in mother-infant dyads. Response to separation in mothers and infants is particularly relevant to our view of mother-infant relationships in terms of the ontogeny of coping. (2) The behavior of the infant following separation under conditions when the pituitary-adrenal response has been pharmacologically altered prior to separation. We have proposed that distress vocalization is an instrumental behavior that leads to mother-infant reunion and, therefore, is a learned response."

Grant: 2P01HD02881, DEVELOPMENTAL AND BEHAVIORAL NEUROENDOCRINOLOGY, was begun in 1977, and was funded until 1990, by NIH's National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). Levine explained the goals and procedures for this program, "We are proposing a set of experiments which will continue our examination of the influence of perinatal malnutrition on behavioral and physiological development in rodents. The dependent variables proposed in these studies will investigate the ability of the previously malnourished rat to respond to varying degrees of low-level stimulation and food-related tasks. In addition, a series of experiments are proposed which will investigate the psychobiology of attachment. In particular we are concerned with (a) the behavioral and physiological effects of prolonged separation in squirrel monkey mother and infants; (b) whether maternal behavior from another adult conspecific ("aunt") can assume some of the functions of the attachment figure (mother); and (c) whether the response to separation can be altered if the mother and/or infant are provided with predictability or control during repeated separations. The specificity of the behavioral and physiological responses to maternal figures will also be studied in the rhesus macaque. Other studies using rhesus macaques will investigate the response to different separation procedures and the effects of separation as a function of developmental changes in mother-infant relationships. We also propose to evaluate the pituitary-adrenal response of adult and juvenile conspecifics to stimuli produced by a separated infant and the development of fear of strangers in infant squirrel monkeys. Finally, we propose to establish a laboratory model of adolescence by examining behavioral and gonadal hormone changes that occur during puberty in the squirrel monkey."

Another of Levine's grants, 5 R01MH047573, LONG TERM CONSEQUENCES OF POSTNATAL STRESS, was funded for a shorter duration, from 1991 through 1996, the study brought in a good income stream. In 1992 Levine collected $266,232 from the study. In 1993, Levine received $288,710 and in 1994, $335,912.

Levine's abstract for the study explained, "The specific aims of this proposal are: 1) To assess the long term consequences of exposure to the acute and episodic stress of repeated m-i [mother-infant] separations. We will investigate whether these effects are simply a response to removal from the mother or whether the degree of the stress associated with the separation is important. The length of separation and the environment into which the infant is placed following separation will be varied in ways that have been shown to increase or decrease the indices of stress."

Levine began studying the effects of stress to infants in the early 1950s. Essentially, taxpayers have paid him to pursue this line of work for five decades. Hundreds, if not thousands of animals, both mother and infant rats and monkeys, have been subjected to completely needless harm. Levine's work has demonstrated what has been built into maternal behavior for millennia. Mothers tend to respond to infants in distress. Infants are comforted by such responses. We know this intuitively because babies quiet when held by human or monkey mothers, and calm when licked by mother rats. To claim that it took five decades and millions of dollars to establish this fact, or to demonstrate that stress in infancy can result in life-long disability, is to admit that one lives under a rock. Or, maybe, is cursed with lithic insensitivity.

For Levine's own view of his life's work see: http://neuroscience.ucdavis.edu/psychiatry/faculty/levine_seymour.html
and,
http://www.udel.edu/psych/fingerle/levine.htm

[All dollar amounts quoted are available online at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/award/award.htm
Quotes attributed to Levine, other than Blum’s, are from:
https://www-commons.cit.nih.gov/crisp/index.html ]

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