Motherhood overrides the brain’s decision-making
Motherhood takes over the brain’s decision-making regions to prioritize caring for offspring, according to new research in rats published in eNeuro.
Making decisions requires the medial prefrontal cortex filtering and repressing multiple streams of information. This often involves picking between powerful, conflicting stimuli, such as when drug-using mothers must choose between their new child or drug-seeking. Since the most effective addiction therapies in this situation work by emphasizing the mother/infant relationship, Pereira and Morrell hypothesized that a brain region must direct a mother to prioritize offspring over drugs.
To pinpoint this brain region, the team temporarily inactivated different regions of rats’ prefrontal cortices with a local anesthetic and tested the rats’ preference for their pups or cocaine. Before inactivation, 40% of rats preferred to spend time in a room associated with cocaine, 40% preferred a pup-associated room, and 20% preferred a neutral room.
Source: Read Full Article