I feel there is enough happening in the brain that we need to understand it further beyond classical physics can allow. I suspect especially that a mother and child share a strong lifelong subspace bond, whereby they can sense one another's state, in a way that logic or physics cannot explain. This sensing bond probably exists with others too but at an exponentially weaker level. I am not asserting anything, only begging inquiry.
you could scientifically test this easily put n mothers and children in adjacent rooms and smack half the kids and measure the mothers opinion of the childs state. id wager no statistically difference