Neurobiological bases of paternal nurturance

描述(申请人提供)：在像我们这样的现代西方社会，在没有父亲的情况下长大与儿童的一系列负面发展结果有关，包括药物滥用、攻击性和品行障碍、辍学和青春期的危险性行为。然而，当父亲在场时，他们并不总是乐于助人，一小部分人甚至辱骂。另一方面，由敏感、有教养的父亲抚养的孩子有更好的认知、行为、社会和心理结果。拟议中的项目将调查敏感父亲背后的神经生物学，并确定药物干预是否可以增强这种作用。第一个目标是调查父亲对婴儿图片和哭声刺激的神经反应与父亲在日常生活中的实际行为之间的关系，这是由电子激活记录器(EAR)评估的，EAR是一种便携式数字音频记录器，定期记录环境声音的简短片段，并悄悄地对参与者的瞬时社会环境和他们生活自然流畅中的互动进行声学观察。此目标将使用先前收集的耳朵 来自60个1-3岁孩子的父亲的数据编码了几个父亲行为的衡量标准。然后，父亲行为的测量将与之前从相同父亲那里收集的神经成像数据相关联。目标2将确定鼻腔注射催产素或精氨酸加压素是否会改变父亲对自己孩子的照片和哭声刺激的神经反应。30名带着1-3岁孩子的父亲将在观看自己和未知孩子的照片时，以及在他们听到未知的婴儿哭声刺激时，进行功能核磁共振成像。父亲将在两个不同的场合进行扫描；一次是在OT(n=15)或AVP(n=15)的影响下，另一次是在安慰剂的影响下。行政秩序将在不同的主题之间得到平衡。最终，人们希望，这样的干预措施将改善儿童的心理和身体健康，因为它们对有风险的父亲(例如，虐待父亲、患有产后抑郁症的父亲)的麸皮生理和行为产生影响。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): In modern, western societies like ours, being raised without a father is associated with a host of negative developmental outcomes for children, including substance abuse, aggression and conduct disorder, dropping out of school and risky sexual behavior in adolescence. When fathers are present, however, they are not always helpful, and a small minority are even abusive. On the other hand, children raised by sensitive, nurturing fathers have better cognitive, behavioral, social and psychological outcomes. The proposed project will investigate the neurobiology underlying sensitive fathering and determine whether a pharmacological intervention can enhance it. The first aim is to investigate the relationship between fathers' neural responses to infant picture and cry stimuli and actual behavior of fathers in everyday life as assessed by the Electronic Activated Recorder (EAR), a portable digital audio recorder that periodically records brief snippets of ambient sounds and unobtrusively samples acoustic observations of participants' momentary social environments and interactions within the natural flow of their lives. This aim will use previously collected EAR data from 60 fathers of 1-3 year old children to code several measures of paternal behavior. Measures of paternal behavior will then be correlated with previously collected neuroimaging data from the same fathers. Aim 2 will determine if intranasal OT or AVP alter paternal neural responses to own child picture and cry stimuli. Thirty fathers with 1- 3 year old children will be imaged with fMRI as they view pictures of their own and unknown children and as they listen to unknown infant cry stimuli. Fathers will be scanned on two separate occasions; once under the influence of OT (n=15) or AVP (n=15), and once under the influence of a placebo. Order of administration will be counterbalanced across subjects. Ultimately, it is hoped that interventions like these will improve children's mental and physical health by virtue of their effects on the bran physiology and behavior of at-risk fathers (e.g., abusive fathers, fathers with post-partum depression).