The Physical Nature of Christian Life
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GENIE
Genie (a pseudonym) was discovered by Child Protective Services in a home in Los Angeles at the age of thirteen. Since very early childhood, she had been strapped to a potty chair during the day and caged in a crib all night. She was never spoken to and when she was brought food or given minimal other care, she was barked at rather than spoken to. Her father was paranoid and disliked noise, so there were no ambient sounds of conversation, television, or radio to be heard.
When first discovered, Genie was thought to be autistic. She had several rocking and self-stimulating habits and was difficult to engage socially. Because of her limited opportunity for movement (such as walking or playing), her motor development was abnormal. She walked bent over with a type of bunny hop. At first, Genie had no language capacity and was basically mute. With extensive language training, she eventually gained some vocabulary, but she was never able to say words that sounded phonologically entirely correct, and she never developed more than minimal competence in grammar in either her speaking or comprehension of speech. Of course, her social interactions were severely abnormal, with particular problems with anger management and childlike behavioral interactions. It took her several months just to learn how to smile. After several foster placements, she finally ended up in a home for the mentally disabled, where she resides at this writing. As an adult, she lapsed into a state similar to dementia.
THE SOCIAL BASIS OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
Genie was autisticlike, socially inept, linguistically deficient, and generally mentally disabled, but not because of some brain disorder. Rather, Genie was the victim of severe childhood social deprivation. She had lived for thirteen years without the usual love of parents, interaction with other people, and the stimulation gained from exploration of the physical and cultural world. She is a tragic illustration of the fact that, despite all the genetic influences that result in normal human bodies and brains, as well as differences in basic temperament, persons do not come preformed. Rather, at birth we are mentally and socially unformed, amorphous, plastic, and open to being shaped by the environment.
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