Why are women so obsessed with babies?

Question

We've all seen it, and experienced it.... a woman goes to her office with a baby, and all the other women start flipping out and making these really high pitch noises (awww... he's so cute!), they start crowding around and basically act like a coop full of excited hens. I'm not trying to be sexist, but from a male point of view this is just insanity. I know having children is something that most women want to do at some point in their lives, and I realize that it probably has something to do with their maternal instincts, genetics, hormones, etc. I just wanted to ask the question: What is all the fuss about? They're just tiny humans that eat, poop, sleep, cry, and gurgle....

Answer 1

Women and female animals are biologically hard-wired to be able to experience maternal feelings toward babies that are not just their own. Men and male animals are biologically hard-wired to have difficulty having warm feelings toward any baby who he knows is not his own. Obviously, people are advanced enough intellectually to have overcome some of this biological hard-wiring, but it can still be there to some extent.

This is why so many step-fathers and live-in boyfriends are often the ones who abuse children.

It is an incorrect presumption you've made that women are "obsessed" with babies. They respond to them - that's all. That doesn't equal being "obsessed".

Also, women who have had children are very genuine happy for the mother of the baby because they know what a wonderful time in her life she's in right now. Women who have not yet had children themselves tend to see having a baby as a hard-to-believe and overwhelmingly big event in a woman's life; so they, too, are happy for the new mother. Women are also happy once a baby is born that the mother and baby both got through it ok, because although it isn't all that common sometimes one or the other doesn't get through it ok.

Female animals have been known to "adopt" the babies of other animals either of their own or another species.

It isn't hormones for the "onlooking" women. Its brain development. Everyone has a brain, and every brain has certain parts of it that do certain things. Although men and women can have a very balanced brain development sometimes (which tends to depend on the type of nurturing they received in the first three years of their lives), often the part of the brain responsible for "human understanding" and "human skills" is more developed in women than it is in some men. Maybe gender gives each person a boost in developing a brain in one direction or another; but nurturing in the first three years of life forms connections. So - for whatever reason - many women have brains that are more developed when it comes to nurturing - and it is the nurturing instinct that makes them respond both to the new baby and to the new mother. It is also probably a sense of friendship as well, but good friends try to nurture each other if possible; so its all kind of the same thing.

Some people believe that because little girls are encourage to nurture when they're pre-schoolers this part of the brain gets more developed than it does in some boys.

The part of that brain involved also results in a high degree of maturity and sometimes spirituality or "deeper" thinking. This means women are more tuned in to the meaning of a new life, any spiritual aspects of it, the seriousness of possible consequences of childbirth, the way a new baby changes the mother, herself (both intellectually and emotionally) and the fact that the new mother is now responsible for "building a person" (by nurturing just the right way, see www.zerotothree.org to understand how important the right type of nurturing is). Women who are normal (and not sociopaths or otherwise emotionally damaged) don't see babies as "just tiny humans" who don't do much or as things.

As far as other maternal instincts go, women tend to see new babies as helpless creatures who are at the mercy of a world that isn't always kind; and maternal instinct can make them want to show that baby that the world is also friendly and kind. Women can have great compassion for a tiny creature who is helpless, has no voice and no choice.

It is not insanity. It is something for which men should respect women because in this one, particular, area many women are superior to many men.

Women have a certain type of emotional closeness with their women friends that men don't tend to have. If you had a "scale of relating to others and social skills" and had autistic people at the farthest right-hand end, most women would be at the farthest left-hand end, while many men would be somewhere between women and autistic people.

It is now known that giving birth sets off hormones that actually make a woman's brain develop a little more. What is now also known is that raising a child improves the brains of both mothers and, (as far as I understand it) to a lesser extent, fathers. This could explain why young men who have no children just don't have a clue about why babies would bring out nurturing instincts in people; while men who are very involved with raising their own children are far more "emotional" and nurturing. It apparently takes being very involved with the raising of his own children for many men to develop that part of their brain a little better. Men who are not involved will not add to their own brain development, so they short-change themselves and their children as well.

Men tend to have the benefit of testosterone and whatever other hormes are involved in the building of self-confidence; but the result is many men are so "confident" in themselves they see people who are different from them as "insane" or "obsessed" when the reality is it is the very lack of all that overblown confidence in women that makes them more understanding, compassionate, and nurturing people who care equally or even more about other people than they tend to care for themselves.

I know your question wasn't intended to be all that serious, but your choice of words like, "insanity" and "hens", is demeaning to women.

That instinct (or brain development) in women that causes them to do exactly what you have said they do (I don't argue with that) is not the fluffy, silly, froo-froo, little instinct it may appear to be; because that instinct is the very thing that - in situations not as pleasant and nice as meeting a new baby - makes women fierce enough, tough enough, strong enough, unselfish enough, and intelligent enough to be able to get their children through some very rough times and get to a day when they see that their children and family have come out not only whole, but strong and close.

I'm not saying all men are awful. I'm not a man-hater. I had a great father, and I've got a couple of great sons (one is adopted because of that very instinct about which I speak), and other men in my life I care very much about. The reality is, though, that many men are just a little too egotistical, too selfish, and too (pardon the word) ignorant about human development/needs to always be able to put aside their own needs and wants and be able to do what is right for the children. I don't want to be sexist either; but from my point-of-view, too many men come up short when it comes understanding other people.

If a guy sees women in the office fawning over someone's baby I would hope they would think, "How nice that these people are so happy for their friend. What a nice thing that this group of people are so happy to welcome a new life into the world."

That thing you described that women do can look silly and light within the context of (and in contrast to) an office setting; but it is the thing in women that makes the lady across the street bring a casserole and ask if there's something she can do to help when there's a death in your family. Its the thing that makes a mother figure out how to get her only daughter a new prom gown even though her daughter's father says she doesn't need one. Its the thing that makes a stay-at-home-Mom find a way to hang onto her family's home when her husband dies. It is the thing that makes a woman see a child who needs the life she could offer and decide to become his mother. Its the thing that make a woman be better support for her friend than her friend's husband may be. It is the thing that makes a whole bunch of elderly lady's in one small town try to find ways to help a younger woman who is going through a difficult time. Maybe more than any physiological thing, women develop close bonds with other women and their children because so often, for one reason or another (sometimes good ones, sometimes not) men "aren't there" for women and children; but - funny thing - this thing that women do pretty much means that women and their children do quite well in the absence of men.

The women in the office aren't "making a fuss". They're sharing joy. They're empathizing. If you look up types of intelligence you'll find that a high degree of empathy is associated with high intelligence.

Sorry to have turned your light question into a heavy thing, but I figure this is a chance to point all this out and have it on the Internet in case any other men happen to get the chance to read it.

Answer 2

Women want babies for the same reason as men. They want something pure and beautiful to come out of themselves. Biologists may argue that it is genetically programmed into them to keep the human race populated, however with 6 billion people on the Earth we are not at risk to lose a human population so in this day and age that alone does not address why. When you look at your own life and realize there are many things you wish you could change or would've done better/differently then you understand the potential within a child...they are closer to perfection than jaded adults who feel too old/stubborn to make changes.

Answer 3

I'm a girl and I never thought babies were that great. You're right, all they do is sleep, eat, and poop. Don't get me wrong I think they're cute, well some of them anyway. I don't know maybe I will think differently if I ever have one of my own.

Answer 4

I agree with Tucson. Although I love children and hope to have some one day, I'm not too wild about infants.

Answer 5

Because Mom's love their babies! It is probably also a trait of the female sex, cause let's face it, if we didn't like babies, the world would be unpopulated. Human babies are also one of the most helpless newborns of all species, we have to be genetically attracted to them in order to take care of them. (And again, I just LOVE MY KIDS!) :)

LOL parTgal....love that answer! Funny, cause it's true!!

Answer 6

One reason is actually because we want to make a fuss over the mother, it's kind of sharing in her joy by making a big fuss over the baby and her.
And the reason we're so into babies is cos it's just instinctual. They're cute, they're helpless, they're innocent, we can't help it.

Answer 7

Because something has to make me what to kill myself.

Answer 8

Because, no matter how cliché it sounds, it is still a miracle. The mother carried this child 9 months and lived through it. The baby is healthy and happy. Something very ingrained in most of us responds to this with Happiness and Joy.

Answer 9

because women are insane!!!

Answer 10

Because babies are so smuggling soft cute and precious to everyone and after all the reason for the future.

Answer 11

What do you care? My goodness, is this the biggest thing in the world you have to complain about? Or do you complain about everything. Get a clue, Sparky, your mother is, or was a woman. I bet you like sleeping with them and taking them places. Maybe not, maybe your prefernce is on the other side of the aisle.