More on the Today Show and Marie Claire
Posted on 20. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Last week’s airing of the Today Show piece related to Marie Claire’s take on at-home-fathers-as-status-symbols gave dads some more to chew on, and there are a couple of follow-ups worth making.
First, Jason Sperber, the dad profiled by Today and by Marie Claire, wrote about his experiences on his blog. It’s worth the read. Part of what Jason talks about is the danger of being sucker-punched by the media. His experience with at-home fatherhood is pretty much glowing, from what I can tell, and yet the magazine chose to include some quotes from his wife that suggested something different. To her credit, the Marie Claire magazine reporter, Hilary Stout, apologized (in a fashion) and let Jason quote from that e-mail.
I can sympathize. A long time ago, a reporter for a national magazine played the same stunt on my wife and me. We gave, in total, nearly 3 hours of interviews, talking about how we made our decisions, how it benefited everyone in the family and the statements we wanted to make about gender roles and equity. And — out of that — were pulled two quotes that made both of us sound whiny. I was, to say the least, horrified. (And that’s why, all the years later, I’m not linking to it.)
The second bit of commentary related to Today was that, once, I ended up on set with Matt Lauer and that he mentioned to me (and rockstar academic Aaron Rochlen) that he hoped to be an at-home dad some day. Maybe all of this at-home dad stuff that has become so prominent on Today is just advanced research for Matt. I, for one, can’t wait to see him trade the wingtips for Chuck Taylors and make the annual pilgrimage to the At-Home Dad Convention.
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Of Mice and Men (Actually: Of Rats and Dads)
Posted on 19. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Earlier this week, Scientific American posted an absolute must-read on the way that the presence of a father changes the brain of his newborns and how — in turn — a new dad’s brain is fundamentally changed by the experience. There is a big caveat to note: the work referenced was in degu rats. But the results were interesting. When male rats were physically present — touching — their offspring, they grew new brain cells:
But the extra boost of brain cells only occurred if the mouse father stayed in the nest. In other words, if he was removed on the day of their birth, nothing happened. One new set of brain cells formed in the olfactory bulb, and were specifically tuned to the smells of his pups. Another set of neurons grew in the hippocampus, a crucial memory center in the brain, which helped to consolidate the smell of his pups into a long-term memory.
So while I certainly might have felt like a moron when I was first struggling to learn the ropes of parenting, there was actually a lot going on upstairs (if you can assume that my brain works like that of a degu rat). On the flip side, if the dad was removed from the kids, they had fewer brain connections than baby rats who got to hang with dad:
Specifically, the degu pups raised without fathers had fewer synapses in both the orbitofrontal cortex and the somatosensory cortex. Having fewer synapses can alter the way information is processed in the young animals, and would make these brain areas perform abnormally.
Of course, it’s great sport to over-extrapolate this kind of research into humans and, indeed, a number of valid criticisms are leveled in the comments to the SciAm piece. It’s not clear if human brains work the same way. It’s not clear if the family bond has anything to do with this (would non-paternal rats experience the same effect?). All of this, taken together, makes it tough to consider this a major piece of evidence suggesting that human kids are doomed without their biological father in the picture (even though the piece hints at that idea). It’s not that easy to tease apart biology, circumstance and social norms. As I’ve said before, if you have a kid in a loving and stable household, he or she will probably do well, regardless of who the other members of the household are (mom/dad/stepparent/uncle/aunt/older sibling/grandparent/etc./etc.).
That said, I’m still a sucker for evidence that suggests that having an involved dad (or father figure) does help around the margins. And this week, I got that, too. USA Today, reporting from the American Psychological Association meeting, reported that sons who had good relationships with their fathers when growing up ended up being better able to handle stress. (The article was not all that detailed, which makes me wonder if the same effect was seen with daughters … I assume not.) At any rate, if you’re a dad with a son and things are going well, you can add that to the things to feel good about.
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Can I Nominate NPM as a Convention Speaker for 2011?
Posted on 18. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Via celeb site PopEater.com comes the news that Neil Patrick Harris is a) preparing to have a baby with his partner and b) considering bailing on showbiz to an at-home dad. While this would probably not be good for the cause of humor and mirth, it would make NPH one heck of a high profile AHD.
With the caveat that I’m sure anyone can really trust celeb news, here is how it was positioned:
“Neil has been working his butt off since he was a little kid,” a friend of the actor tells me. “Everything was about his career until he met his soul-mate, David. Now, with twins due in October, Neil is thinking about taking a break. Moving from Hollywood to New York City to be a full-time daddy.”
Neil: if you’re reading … you might want to check out the kick-ass NYC Dads Group.