Much has been written about what happens to mothers hormonally during pregnancy and after, but what about fathers?
In a first-of-its-kind study, University of Notre Dame Assistant Professor of Anthropology Lee Gettler and lead author Patty Kuo, visiting assistant professor of psychology, focused on how dads' biology around the birth of their children relates to their parenting down the road. They partnered with Notre Dame psychologists and Memorial Hospital of South Bend to analyze testosterone and cortisol in 298 men on the first two days of their newborns' lives.
"Studies like this give us an understanding of the value of having the dad present at birth and engaging with the baby," said Gettler. "What we see in the special days around birth is that dads' hormones—how much dads are producing overall and how their hormones quickly change when they hold their newborns—are linked to what fathers are doing months later. This relates to how men establish bonds with their newborns as well as with their partners and how they will co-parent."
[For more on this story by Colleen Sharkey, go to https://medicalxpress.com/news...mone-caregiving.html]
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