Science!

Parenting requires unique skill sets.

Mothers and fathers need to anticipate their children’s needs, and understand and care for them, often with no experience and on very little sleep.

So, it’s not surprising that parents would need to adapt to be successful in their new roles, some researchers said.


Studies have shown, for instance, that when women become pregnant and after they give birth, physical changes occur in their brains that, some researchers suspect, may help prepare women for motherhood.


And research shows that new fathers go through similar changes.

The brain changes that men experience may support “the ability to form a bond with the baby and connect sensitively to the baby because that’s important for our species’ survival,” said Darby Saxbe, a professor of psychology at the University of Southern California who has been studying structural brain changes.


Saxbe and her then colleagues in Spain conducted brain-imaging studies on 40 expectant fathers before and after the birth of their first child, she said.

The researchers discovered that while the structural changes were more subtle than what has been observed in women, men experienced a reduction in gray matter before and after they became fathers.

The researchers noted that these changes occurred primarily in the cerebral cortex, which plays a role in executive functioning, including memory, thinking, reasoning, learning, problem-solving and emotional processing.

This reduction, a type of streamlining process, is thought to help the brain process information more efficiently, Saxbe said.


Indeed, in a follow-up study, Saxbe and a colleague found that among 38 first-time fathers, those who experienced more-significant reduction in gray matter volume in the cerebral cortex reported more motivation and engagement toward parenthood…….


https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2024/06/14/men-brain-fatherhood-bonding-changes/