Explaining individual variation in paternal brain responses to infant cries (original) (raw)
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Behavioral and genetic correlates of the neural response to infant crying among human fathers
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 2013
Although evolution has shaped human infant crying and the corresponding response from caregivers, there is marked variation in paternal involvement and caretaking behavior, highlighting the importance of understanding the neurobiology supporting optimal paternal responses to cries. We explored the neural response to infant cries in fathers of children aged 1-2, and its relationship with hormone levels, variation in the androgen receptor (AR) gene, parental attitudes and parental behavior. Although number of AR CAG trinucleotide repeats was positively correlated with neural activity in brain regions important for empathy (anterior insula and inferior frontal gyrus), restrictive attitudes were inversely correlated with neural activity in these regions and with regions involved with emotion regulation (orbitofrontal cortex). Anterior insula activity had a non-linear relationship with paternal caregiving, such that fathers with intermediate activation were most involved. These results suggest that restrictive attitudes may be associated with decreased empathy and emotion regulation in response to a child in distress, and that moderate anterior insula activity reflects an optimal level of arousal that supports engaged fathering.
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 2020
Expectant parents’ responses to infant cry may indicate future risk and resiliency in the parent-child relationship. Most studies of parental reactivity to infant cry have focused on mothers, and few studies have focused on expectant fathers, although fathers make important contributions to parenting. Additionally, although different responses to infant cry (behavioral, psychological and neural) are hypothesized to track together, few studies have analyzed them concurrently. The current investigation aimed to address these gaps by characterizing multimodal responses to infant cry within expectant fathers and testing whether prenatal testosterone moderates these responses. Expectant fathers responded to infant cry vs frequency-matched white noise with increased activation in bilateral areas of the temporal lobe involved in processing speech sounds and social and emotional stimuli. Handgrip force, which has been used to measure parents’ reactivity to cry sounds in previous studies, di...
2020
In the present hypothesis generating study, behavioral and neural responses to infant crying, as well as paternal hormone levels, were measured in both the prenatal and early postnatal period. Using a longitudinal design, we investigated parental sensitivity, handgrip force, and neural activation in response to infant crying sounds, in addition to testosterone baseline levels, in 25 first-time fathers. We describe the extent to which these aspects of paternal care are related across the perinatal period. The current exploratory study adds to the understudied field of early paternal care by making recommendations, and proposing hypotheses for future studies.
Brain Sciences
As fathers are increasingly involved in childcare, understanding the neurological underpinnings of fathering has become a key research issue in developmental psychobiology research. This systematic review specifically focused on (1) highlighting methodological issues of paternal brain research using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and (2) summarizing findings related to paternal brain responses to auditory and visual infant stimuli. Sixteen papers were included from 157 retrieved records. Sample characteristics (e.g., fathers’ and infant’s age, number of kids, and time spent caregiving), neuroimaging information (e.g., technique, task, stimuli, and processing), and main findings were synthesized by two independent authors. Most of the reviewed works used different stimuli and tasks to test fathers’ responses to child visual and/or auditory stimuli. Pre-processing and first-level analyses were performed with standard pipelines. Greater heterogeneity emerged in second-lev...
Neural responses to infants linked with behavioral interactions and testosterone in fathers
Biological Psychology, 2012
Few fMRI studies have investigated the brain-behavioral basis of parenting in human fathers. Ten fathers were videotaped and gave salivary testosterone samples while interacting with their 2-4 month old infants, and viewed video clips of their own infant and an unfamiliar age-, ethnicityand sex-matched other infant during an fMRI protocol. Infant stimuli activated a network of prefrontal and subcortical brain regions. Furthermore, a subset of these regions activated significantly more to own (OWN) than other (OTHER) infants. Finally, neural responses to OWN versus OTHER were linked with paternal sensitivity, paternal reciprocity, and testosterone. In sum, our results provide a novel perspective on the links between brain, behavior, and hormones in fathers. Keywords fathers; testosterone; fMRI; infant Previous studies have investigated maternal responses to infant stimuli (
The missing link: Mothers’ neural response to infant cry related to infant attachment behaviors
Infant Behavior and Development, 2012
This study addresses a gap in the attachment literature by investigating maternal neural response to cry related to infant attachment classifications and behaviors. Twenty-two primiparous mothers and their 18-month old infants completed the Strange Situation (SS) procedure to elicit attachment behaviors. During a separate functional MRI session, mothers were exposed to their own infant's cry sound, as well as an unfamiliar infant's cry and control sound. Maternal neural response to own infant cry related to both overall attachment security and specific infant behaviors. Mothers of less secure infants maintained greater activation to their cry in left parahippocampal and amygdala regions and the right posterior insula consistent with a negative schematic response bias. Mothers of infants exhibiting more avoidant or contact maintaining behaviors during the SS showed diminished response across left prefrontal, parietal, and cerebellar areas involved in attentional processing and cognitive control. Mothers of infants exhibiting more disorganized behavior showed reduced response in bilateral temporal and subcallosal areas relevant to social cognition and emotion regulation. No differences by attachment classification were found. Implications for attachment transmission models are discussed.
2014
With a secure foundation in basic research across mammalian species in which fathers participate in the raising of young, novel brainimaging approaches are outlining a set of consistent brain circuits that regulate paternal thoughts and behaviors in humans. The newest experimental paradigms include increasingly realistic baby-stimuli to provoke paternal cognitions and behaviors with coordinated hormone measures to outline brain networks that regulate motivation, reflexive caring, emotion regulation, and social brain networks with differences and similarities to those found in mothers. In this article, on the father brain, we review all brain-imaging studies on PubMed to date on the human father brain and introduce the topic with a selection of theoretical models and foundational neurohormonal research on animal models in support of the human work. We discuss potentially translatable models for the identification and treatment of paternal mood and father-child relational problems, which could improve infant mental health and developmental trajectories with potentially broad public health importance.
Psychiatry, 2008
Interacting parenting thoughts and behaviors critically shape human infants' current and future behavior. Indeed, the parent-infant relationship provides infants with their first social environment, forming templates for what they can expect from others and how best to interact with them. This paper focuses on the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiments relevant to the study of the brain-basis of parenting. First there is a brief introduction to techniques and a selective review of functional neuroimaging studies that examine fMRI responses to infant stimuli: baby sounds or visuals. Next, there is a sample single-subject set of brain imaging data of brain response to own-baby-cry. Finally, there is a proposed model of how infant stimuli activate parent brain circuits, including sensory analysis brain regions, as well as corticolimbic circuits that regulate motivation, reward, and learning about their infants, and ultimately organize parenting impulses, thoughts,...
Development and Psychopathology, 2017
Parental responses to their children are crucially influenced by stress. However, brain-based mechanistic understanding of the adverse effects of parenting stress and benefits of therapeutic interventions is lacking. We studied maternal brain responses to salient child signals as a function of Mom Power (MP), an attachment-based parenting intervention established to decrease maternal distress. Twenty-nine mothers underwent two functional magnetic resonance imaging brain scans during a baby-cry task designed to solicit maternal responses to child's or self's distress signals. Between scans, mothers were pseudorandomly assigned to either MP (n = 14) or control (n = 15) with groups balanced for depression. Compared to control, MP decreased parenting stress and increased child-focused responses in social brain areas highlighted by the precuneus and its functional connectivity with subgenual anterior cingulate cortex, which are key components of reflective self-awareness and deci...
Scientific reports, 2017
The transition to motherhood, and the resultant experience of caregiving, may change the way women respond to affective, infant signals in their environments. Nonhuman animal studies have robustly demonstrated that mothers process both infant and other salient signals differently from nonmothers. Here, we investigated how women with and without young infants respond to vocalisations from infants and adults (both crying and neutral). We examined mothers with infants ranging in age (1-14 months) to examine the effects of duration of maternal experience. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we found that mothers showed greater activity than nonmothers to vocalisations from adults or infants in a range of cortical regions implicated in the processing of affective auditory cues. This main effect of maternal status suggests a general difference in vocalisation processing across infant and adult sounds. We found that a longer duration of motherhood, and therefore more experience wi...