– It seems that women are not the only humans hardwired to develop a so-called maternal instinct, but that it can happen to anyone who chooses to become a parent. A recent study conducted by Ruth Feldman, a psychologist and neuroscientist at Bar-Ilan University in Israel, revealed that caring for children stimulates in the male brain a parenting system often considered as a female exclusivity.

– Two family types were involved in the research: on one hand, traditional families with a biological mother as primary caregiver, accompanied by a very involved father; and on the other hand homosexual male couples, one of the two partners being the biological father. The analysis performed on the participants – the mothers, their husbands, and the homosexual father-father couples – showed the activation of the same kind of “parenting network” in the brain of all of them.

Image: PHOTOBAC/ISTOCKPHOTO/THINKSTOCK

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