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Gay dads' brains show activity akin to both parents': study | Reuters
(Reuters) - Having a baby alters new mothers' brain activity, researchers have found, and a new study adds the first evidence of such changes in the brains of gay men raising children they adopted through surrogacy.
The men's pattern of brain activity resembles that of both new mothers and new fathers in the study.
The 48 gay fathers raising children with their husbands seemed to be both mom and dad, brain-wise. Their emotional circuits were as active as those of mothers and the interpretive circuits showed the same extra activity as that of heterosexual fathers'.
One clue: in gay fathers, but not heterosexual ones, the brain also had extra communication lines between emotional and cognitive structures. The more time a man spent as primary caregiver, the greater the connectivity. It was as if playing both parental roles caused the brain to integrate the structures required for each.
This article makes the claim that "gay men" are more in-tuned parents than either sex of the heterosexual alone. Interesting?
To be fair, the article's exact words were that changes in gay men "resemble" changes in heterosexuals of both sexes, not that they were necessarily better or more "attuned" parents. I would be curious to see if the adaption in any one direction is as strong as it would be in a heterosexual, or if it's not more of compromise between the two.
To be fair, the article's exact words were that changes in gay men "resemble" changes in heterosexuals of both sexes, not that they were necessarily better or more "attuned" parents. I would be curious to see if the adaption in any one direction is as strong as it would be in a heterosexual, or if it's not more of compromise between the two.
Well, I thought the same if the study would apply to heterosexual singles but it sort of excludes that possibility by saying...
"Their emotional circuits were as active as those of mothers and the interpretive circuits showed the same extra activity as that of heterosexual fathers."
They appeared to have the abilities of both parents?
BTW thanks for the word correction on attuned.
Perhaps. I'd just like to see the actual numbers.
It's rather vague right now. Media articles reporting on scientific phenomena also have something of a tendency to get a lot of things wrong in this regard as they're more interested in attracting viewers with attention grabbing language than they are in the specific details of the findings involved.
This article makes the claim that "gay men" are more attuned parents than either sex of the heterosexual alone. Interesting?
Perhaps. I'd just like to see the actual numbers.
It's rather vague right now. Media articles reporting on scientific phenomena also have something of a tendency to get a lot of things wrong in this regard as they're more interested in attracting viewers with attention grabbing language than they are in the specific details of the findings involved.
I had seen studies a few years ago that showed that a homosexual uncle in the family increases the probability of a child's survival to adulthood.
Also in our convoluted and high pressure 'publish or perish' world, it is getting tougher and tougher for the ever increasing number of advanced degree candidates to find something new and unique as the topic of their dissertations or to be published in a scholarly journal. As a result they are really streeeeeeetching for subject matter. And it doesn't matter how small the sample used or what the researcher's conclusion is, it seems to pass for science these days.
I remain convinced that gay parents can be very good parents and sometimes living with gay parents is the best situation for the child. And I will continue to be convinced that there is far more scientific study and evidence to show that children overall thrive best with a loving male AND female role model in the home than in any other circumstance. And the traditional family should be encouraged, supported, and considered the norm for that reason.
I remember an episode of "Friends", where Rachel and Ross were looking for a Nanny to take care of their baby. They found a really sensitive guy (hetero?) that was like a 'super baby sitter'. The whole episode sort of revolved around how attuned this guy was to a babies needs and even an adults...lol
He was more than a Nanny, he was a "Manny". :lol:
Rachel was hot for him, if I remember that episode right. Freddie Prinze Junior played the nanny. I don't think he was gay.
How could that possibly even begin to bear out any truth? The "gay-Uncle" has been thoroughly debunked as utter nonsense. Tim-
FYI on the 'gay uncle' to everyone else:I had seen studies a few years ago that showed that a homosexual uncle in the family increases the probability of a child's survival to adulthood.
I remember an episode of "Friends", where Rachel and Ross were looking for a Nanny to take care of their baby. They found a really sensitive guy (hetero?) that was like a 'super baby sitter'. The whole episode sort of revolved around how attuned this guy was to a babies needs and even an adults...lol
He was more than a Nanny, he was a "Manny". :lol:
Bleh. Id be bullied and shunned even more than I already am if I had two gay parents. I'm sure they'd be capable parents, but until the stigma is gone heterosexual parents are the better alternative (in my opinion).
Also in our convoluted and high pressure 'publish or perish' world, it is getting tougher and tougher for the ever increasing number of advanced degree candidates to find something new and unique as the topic of their dissertations or to be published in a scholarly journal. As a result they are really streeeeeeetching for subject matter. And it doesn't matter how small the sample used or what the researcher's conclusion is, it seems to pass for science these days.
I remain convinced that gay parents can be very good parents and sometimes living with gay parents is the best situation for the child. And I will continue to be convinced that there is far more scientific study and evidence to show that children overall thrive best with a loving male AND female role model in the home than in any other circumstance. And the traditional family should be encouraged, supported, and considered the norm for that reason.
Striking similarities between the brains of gay men and straight women have been discovered by neuroscientists, offering fresh evidence that sexual orientation is hardwired into our neural circuitry.
Scans reveal homosexual men and heterosexual women have symmetrical brains, with the right and left hemispheres almost exactly the same size. Conversely, lesbians and straight men have asymmetrical brains, with the right hemisphere significantly larger than the left.
Scientists at the prestigious Stockholm Brain Institute in Sweden also found certain brain circuits linked to emotional responses were the same in gay men and straight women.
The findings, published tomorrow in the US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest the biological factors that influence sexual orientation - such as exposure to testosterone in the womb - may also shape the brain's anatomy.
The study, led by the neurobiologist Ivanka Savic, builds on previous research that has identified differences in spatial and verbal abilities related to sex and sexual orientation. Tests have found gay men and straight women fare better at certain language tasks, while heterosexual men and lesbians tend to have better spatial awareness.
Savic and her colleague Per Linström took MRI brain scans of 90 volunteers who were divided into four groups of similar ages according to whether they were male, female, heterosexual or homosexual. The scans showed the right side of the brain in heterosexual men was typically 2% larger than the left. Lesbians showed a similar asymmetry, with the right hand side of the brain 1% larger than the left.
Scans on homosexual men and heterosexual women revealed both sides of the brain were the same size.
The results could explain a University of London study earlier this year that found gay men and straight women share a poor sense of direction compared with heterosexual men, and were more likely to navigate using landmarks alone.
The right hand side of the brain dominates spatial capabilities, so may be slightly more developed in heterosexual men and lesbians. An earlier study by the same team found gay men and straight women outperformed lesbians and straight men at tasks designed to test verbal fluency.
Savic's team has yet to confirm whether the differences in brain shape are responsible for sexual orientation, or are a consequence of it. To find out, they have begun another study to investigate brain symmetry in newborn babies, to see if it can be used to predict their future sexual orientation.
"These differences might be laid down during brain development in the womb, or they could happen after birth, though it could very likely be a combination of the two," said Savic.
In another series of tests, Savic and Lindström used a technique called positron emission tomography (PET) to look at brain wiring in a smaller group of volunteers. They found heterosexual women and gay men shared brain circuitry linking a region called the amygdala, which plays a key role in emotional responses, to other parts of the brain.
The research is part of a larger effort to identify differences between the male and female brain, in the hope they will shed light on why some mental disorders affect men and women differently. For example, major depressive disorders are far more common and persistent in women, while autism is around four times more common in boys than girls.
"There's a well known uneven sex distribution in the number of psychiatric disorders and trying to understand sex differences, and differences in orientation, may give you a hint of the mechanism underlying these diseases," said Savic.
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