Feral child
Overview
A feral
Feral
A feral organism is one that has changed from being domesticated to being wild or untamed. In the case of plants it is a movement from cultivated to uncultivated or controlled to volunteer. The introduction of feral animals or plants to their non-native regions, like any introduced species, may...

 child
(also, colloquially, wild
Wildness
Wildness is literally the quality of being wild or untamed, but further to this, it has been defined as a quality produced in nature , as that which emerges from a forest , and as a level of achievement in nature...

 child
) is a human child who has lived isolated from human contact from a very young age, and has no (or little) experience of human care, loving or social behavior, and, crucially, of human language
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...

. Some feral children have been confined by people (usually their own parents); in some cases this child abandonment
Child abandonment
Child abandonment is the practice of relinquishing interests and claims over one's offspring with the intent of never again resuming or reasserting them. Causes include many social and cultural factors as well as mental illness. An abandoned child is called a foundling .-Causes:Poverty is often a...

 was due to the parents' rejection of a child's severe intellectual or physical impairment.
 
x
OK