Neurobiological bases of paternal nurturance

在像我们这样的现代西方社会中，没有父亲的抚养伴随着许多负面的东西 儿童的发育结果，包括药物滥用、攻击性和品行障碍、下降 青春期失学和危险的性行为。然而，当父亲在场时，他们就不在了。 总是乐于助人，一小部分人甚至辱骂。另一方面，由敏感的， 养育父亲有更好的认知、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，并确定一种药理学 干预可以加强这一点。第一个目标是调查父亲的神经反应与 婴儿图片和哭闹刺激与父亲日常生活实际行为的电子化测评 激活记录器(EAR)，一种便携式数字音频记录器，定期记录环境的简短片段 声音和不引人注目的样本参与者的瞬时社会环境的声学观察和 在他们生命的自然流动中相互作用。这一目标将使用之前从60位父亲那里收集的耳朵数据 对1-3岁的孩子进行编码，以衡量父亲的行为。然后，父亲行为的衡量标准将 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将决定是否 鼻腔注射催产素或精氨酸加压素可改变父亲对自己孩子图片和哭声刺激的神经反应。三十位父亲和一位- 3岁的儿童将在观看自己和未知儿童的照片时进行功能磁共振成像，并作为 他们会听到未知的婴儿哭声刺激。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，以及一次安慰剂的影响。管理秩序将 在不同的主题之间保持平衡。最终，人们希望像这样的干预措施将改善儿童的 心理和身体健康，因为它们对处于危险中的父亲的大脑生理和行为的影响(例如， 虐待的父亲、患有产后抑郁症的父亲)。

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 brain physiology and behavior of at-risk fathers (e.g., abusive fathers, fathers with post-partum depression).