Poster #20 - Fathers’ cortisol and testosterone in the days following infants’ births predict later paternal involvement

• In Event: 3-206 - Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Section - Biological Processes: Psychophysiology

Integrative Statement

Developmental neuroscientists and biological anthropologists have investigated how fathers’ hormones such as testosterone and cortisol may promote or inhibit positive fathering (Gettler et al., 2011; Kuo et al., 2016; Storey et al., 2011). Previous studies of hormones and fathering have often operationalized a range of fathering-related experiences (fatherhood status, time spent in childcare, play, sensory exposure to infant cues) under the singular construct of "paternal behavior". However, it is likely that that different basal hormone and reactivity patterns may support different behavioral competencies within parenting contexts (Gray et al., 2017; Rilling, 2013; van Anders et al., 2011). Here, we bridge the biobehavioral synchrony model (Feldman, 2012a, c) from developmental neuroscience with life history theory from evolutionary anthropology to examine how hormone reactivity and basal profiles may predict men's parenting behavior across different dimensions of involvement in direct care, indirect care, and play. We assessed whether fathers' testosterone and cortisol reactivity to holding their newborns, as well as basal levels during their infants' first days post-partum, predict later paternal involvement. Based on life history theory, we hypothesized that greater paternal involvement would be predicted by lower basal testosterone and higher basal cortisol. Drawing on the feedback loop concepts proposed in the biobehavioral synchrony model, we predicted that decreases in testosterone and increases in cortisol would be correlated with greater paternal involvement months later.
Method: Participants were 298 fathers whose partners gave birth in a UNICEF-designated "baby-friendly" hospital that encouraged fathers to hold their newborns 1 hour after birth, after mothers engaged in skin-to-skin holding. Salivary testosterone and cortisol were measured before and after fathers' first holding of their newborns. On the following day, fathers provided additional saliva samples for T and CORT to provide control values that reflected the same time of day as the first sample collection on the day of the infant’s birth. Fathers were contacted 2-4 months following discharge to complete questionnaires about involvement in direct care (e.g., bathing child), indirect care (e.g., arranging babysitting), and play using the childcare activities scale (Cronenwett et al., 1988). We conducted a multivariate multiple regression model to examine whether basal and holding-reactivity measures of testosterone and cortisol predicted paternal involvement in direct and indirect care, and play. Parity, marital status, fathers’ age, and infant’s sex were included as covariates.
Results & Discussion: Both basal and reactivity cortisol predicted fathers' greater involvement in childcare and play, whereas only basal testosterone (but not reactivity) predicted direct and indirect care (See Table 1 below). These results evinced that both life history and biobehavioral synchrony models explained associations between cortisol and later paternal involvement. Yet, because only basal testosterone predicted later paternal behavior, our testosterone results provided evidence for life-history theory, but not biobehavioral synchrony theory. Our findings suggest that greater specificity is required in theorizing the relationships between basal or reactivity hormone measures with paternal involvement and provide a newer methodological approach of examining multiple hormones together to predict variations in human behavior.

Authors

• Patty Kuo, University of Notre Dame
  Presenting Author

• Julie Braungart-Rieker, University of Notre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jennifer E Burke Lefever, University of Notre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author

• Mallika S Sarma, University of Notre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author

• Molly O'Neill, University of Notre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author

• Lee Gettler, University of Notre Dame
  Non-Presenting Author