Recent Neuroscience Advances in Human Parenting

Martínez-García, Magdalena; Cardenas, Sofia I.; Pawluski, Jodi; Carmona, Susanna; Saxbe, Darby E.

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-97762-7_8

Magdalena Martínez-García^3,4,
Sofia I. Cardenas⁵,
Jodi Pawluski⁶,
Susanna Carmona^3,4 &
…
Darby E. Saxbe⁵

Part of the book series: Advances in Neurobiology ((NEUROBIOL,volume 27))

704 Accesses
33 Altmetric

Abstract

The transition to parenthood entails brain adaptations to the demands of caring for a newborn. This chapter reviews recent neuroscience findings on human parenting, focusing on neuroimaging studies. First, we describe the brain circuits underlying human maternal behavior, which comprise ancient subcortical circuits and more sophisticated cortical regions. Then, we present the short-term and long-term functional and structural brain adaptations that characterize the transition to motherhood, discuss the long-term effects of parenthood on the brain, and propose several underlying neural mechanisms. We also review neuroimaging findings in biological fathers and alloparents (such as other relatives or adoptive parents), who engage in parenting without directly experiencing pregnancy or childbirth. Finally, we describe perinatal mental illnesses and discuss the neural responses associated with such disorders. To date, studies indicate that parenthood is a period of enhanced brain plasticity within brain areas critical for cognitive and social processing and that both parenting experience and gestational-related factors can prime such plasticity.

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Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria Gregorio Marañón, Madrid, Spain
Magdalena Martínez-García & Susanna Carmona
Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Salud Mental (CIBERSAM), Madrid, Spain
Magdalena Martínez-García & Susanna Carmona
Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Sofia I. Cardenas & Darby E. Saxbe
Univ Rennes, Inserm, EHESP, Irset (Institut de Recherche en Santé, Environnement et Travail), Rennes, France
Jodi Pawluski

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Magdalena Martínez-García
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Gabriela González-Mariscal

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Martínez-García, M., Cardenas, S.I., Pawluski, J., Carmona, S., Saxbe, D.E. (2022). Recent Neuroscience Advances in Human Parenting. In: González-Mariscal, G. (eds) Patterns of Parental Behavior. Advances in Neurobiology, vol 27. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97762-7_8

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