Some human males claim they gain weight when their mates are pregnant. A new study documents a weight gain for some kinds of monkeys when they’re about to be fathers. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach
reports:
Transcript
Some human males claim they gain weight when their mates are
pregnant. A new study documents a weight gain for some kinds of
monkeys when they’re about to be fathers. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison weighed about sixty
cotton-top tamarins, and common marmosets during the study. Those
two squirrel-sized primates are known to be monogamous and good
parents.
Researchers found the male monkeys gained another ten percent in
weight when their partners were expecting. Endocrinologist Toni Ziegler
speculates that hormonal changes help the expectant fathers to bulk up
and prepare to lug around their babies.
“There’s a high energetic cost to being the one which these fathers are to
do most of the infant carrying and since they have twins and sometimes
triplets it’s a big responsibility.”
Ziegler says the additional weight only stays on the male monkeys
during the pregnancy… something their human counterparts can only
hope for.
For the GLRC, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.