Subscribe to Receive the Daily Report

Monday, November 27th, 2023

Paternity leave pays “lifelong dividend” in parental instincts, research finds

Author:     April Rubin
Source:     Axios
Publication Date:     26 November 2023
 Link: Paternity leave pays “lifelong dividend” in parental instincts, research finds
Stephan:  

I keep telling readers that policies that foster wellbeing are always the best option because they are more efficient, more effective, more fostering of social wellbeing, more productive, nicer to live under, and always cheaper. Here is an example that you probably won’t hear about on CNN, MSNBC, FOX, or any of the big newspapers, that illustrates exactly what I mean. It also shows, as usual, that in this area of fostering wellbeing the United States has been embarrassingly second rate.

Illustration: Shoshana Gordon / Axios

Spending quality time with a newborn can shape new fathers’ brains and have a lasting impact on their parenting instincts, new research shows.

Why it matters: The transitional period into parenthood is key for “building the fathering brain,” researchers found, but the U.S. lags behind most of the rest of the world in its paternity leave policies.

  • “Spending engaged time with your new baby is a rare opportunity for long-term success in fatherhood,” the Harvard Business Review wrote.
  • “This short-term time investment has the potential to pay a lifelong dividend in dad instincts.”

What they found: Early stages of parenthood are significant for adult neuroplasticity, or the brain’s structural changes in response to experiences, according to University of Southern California researchers.

  • By spending quality one-on-one time with the newborn, the changes observed in fathers’ brains corresponds with a similar change in mothers’ brains in response to parenting, caregiving, pregnancy and lactation, said psychologist and researcher Darby Saxbe.
  • In a study of first-time fathers in Spain […]
Read the Full Article