Women Are Hardwired to Respond to Infant’s Cries

Lisa Franchi May 08, 2013

Mum knows best – researchers at the National Institutes of Health in the US have found solid evidences for what most mums have long suspected – they are hardwired to respond to a hungry infant’s cries. Findings were published in the journal NeuroReport.

For the study, 18 male and female volunteers were asked to let their minds wander. Some were parents and others were not. During the 15-minute activity, the researchers played a recording of white noise combined with the sounds of a crying infant. Looking at the brain scans of the participants, the research team found that in women, the patterns of brain activity became active the moment they heard the infant cries. On the other hand, men’s brains remained in the resting state. The results did not vary between parents and non-parents.

The Motherly Instinct

According to Marc H. Bornstein, co author of the study and the head of Child and Family Research Section of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), whilst previous studies have shown that men and women respond differently to the sound of an infant’s cry on an emotional level, their findings indicate that such differences are also seen in terms of attention. Previous studies have also shown that women are more likely to respond to an infant’s cry than men, and are more likely to want to care for the child.

To determine whether or not women and men will respond to different types of infant cries (distress, hunger, or the need for physical closeness), the researchers also played a recording of infants who were later diagnosed with autism. In an earlier study by Dr Bornstein, he found that the cries of infants who tend to develop autism spectrum disorder (ASD) were higher in pitch than the normally growing infants. The pauses between their cries are also shorter. Here, they found that both men and women tend to interrupt their mind wandering when they heard the sound of an infant crying.

These studies, according to Dr Bornstein, add to the growing body of research that seeks to understand how adults relate to and care for infants. Nevertheless, it is possible that not all adults exhibit the same patterns that were shown in the study, he added.

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Women’s, men’s brains respond differently to hungry infant’s cries