Feral child
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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A feral child (feral, - wild or undomesticated) is a human child who, from a very young age, has lived in isolation from human contact and has no (or little) experience of human care, loving or social behavior, and, crucially, of human language. Feral children are extremely rare having been brought up by animals, confined by humans (often parents) or live in the wild in isolation. Throughout the world, just over a hundred incidences of the phenomenon have been reported. They are thus considered very interesting case studies from a sociological perspective. When completely brought up by animals the feral child exhibits behaviors (within physical limits) almost entirely like those of the particular animal-carer, including its variety of instincts, fear or indifference to humans, etc. Children with some human experience before isolation from humans are easier to rehabilitate after discovery.
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