マターナル・ブレイン― その適応的メカニズム ―

抄録

Parenting plays a critical role in the infant’s survival and optimal development, as well as in the parent-infant attachment. The parent-infant relationship provides infants with their first social environment, forming templates to interact with others. In this review, we focus on neuroimaging studies of human maternal brain associated with the development of mother-infant relationship. First, we review the functional and structural changes in the mother’s brain during the early postpartum period. Second, we discuss the neural basis of maternal love, in which the orbitofrontal cortex integrates the reward and interoceptive processing systems, which suggests that a mother’s infant is not only a reward, but also functions to protect the mother's life through the production of homeostatic emotions in the mother. Third, we discuss the maternal brain including how the orbitofrontal cortex might possibly regulate maternal stress during the “terrible twos”. Maternal stress adaptations are important not only for the maternal behavior, but also for the mother’s well-being and mental health. Finally, we focus on the long-term effects of the early experience of parental care on the infant’s brain function, including those associated with later parenting and how maternal brain might shape the infant’s current and future brain.