Father's primary impact is in his genetic material. Secondary impact is his parenting impact which starts to matter mostly after child is 2 years old. Before that, from conception to birth to 2 years, mother is much more important.
My daughter is two weeks old today. In the past 14 days, my wife has been responsible for providing 100% of what our baby consumes, but at least half the time, I'm the one feeding her (we're about 50/50 breastfed/pumped breastmilk in a bottle).
Aside from that, there's effectively no difference in our roles in caring for her. We both change diapers, we both bathe her, we both hold her and comfort her when she's fussy. We don't pay any particular attention to making it a 50/50 split for these activities, but it probably works out to approximately that, for all intents and purposes.
Right now her schedule seems fairly nocturnal (she seems most awake from ~2300 to ~0400), and I tend to be the one up with her during that time, since I find I'm pretty productive during those hours anyway (I've gotten pretty good at one-handed typing).
On a practical level, there's effectively no difference in the amount of care provided between her mother and I. Your statement that her impact is "much more important" is fairly offensive to me (and while I haven't bothered talking to my wife about a comment on Hacker News... I suspect she would be equally offended).
Congratulations! My daughter was born almost four weeks ago, though we've only had her home a week (she was premature and spent a while in the NICU.) I'm glad you're getting stuff done at night; I've been stuck on the same moderately complex C++ state machine implementation since she was born. I'm just too tired to load the problem into my head.
While my wife is theoretically capable of doing everything on her own we share duties like you do, if only because there's no way I could allow the woman I married to suffer the entire burden of childcare unsupported. I don't know of anyone who does things any differently.
> I've gotten pretty good at one-handed typing
In another context that would be a source of shame, not pride :)
In bearmf's defence, we do matter more to the child after 2 years old. What we're doing now is supporting the mother.
JshWright, congratulations! I am sure you are going to be a great father.
That said, you cannot be a mother to your child. Your roles now are approximately equal, but they will inevitably change over time. Feeding and changing diapers is enough for now, and that indeed can be split between partners, because baby cannot really tell the difference right now.
For further normal development, babies need to develop a bond with their mother. This gives them a fundamental sense of security. It is one of human baby's primary needs which is also observed in most mammals.
Children later become attached to their fathers. It is a different experience for them, which involves more "rational" thought instead of primary urge to bond with their mothers.
I'd be interested in seeing any research you may have seen that supports your position. Anecdotally, that hasn't been my experience (in those around me, obviously)
However, I see that there is nothing in the article specifically about primary caregiver being female. To summarize, it is better to have one primary caregiver who has established a strong attachment with child. Traditionally it has been a female role, and I do believe women are better suited for it.
I don't see anything in that article to suggest 1 primary caregiver is best. The sense I got was that children got a benefit from having a strong attachment, but no arguement or experiment to test for weather 1 strong attachment is better than 2, possibly weaker, attachments.
Also, I am always suspisous of 2nd hand science reports, especially when they do not provide a direct link to the original paper(s). If anyone does track down some research papers on the subject, please post it here.
Sort of ditto gizmo686; the article cited confounds primary caregiver and mother, and I would be surprised if the authors of the source articles had the kind of data that would disambiguate the two. Which women are better than which other caregivers? The idea that every women/mother is automatically better suited as primary caregiver is a old stereotype that continues to do harm.
> For further normal development, babies need to develop a bond with their mother. This gives them a fundamental sense of security. It is one of human baby's primary needs which is also observed in most mammals.
All due respect, but you're talking garbage. Please stop with this sexist drivel.
Yes, I do have a daughter.
I have never said that babies do not recognize their fathers. It is just that their attachment to mother is usually more important in their first few years of life.
A baby can bond with the Father emotionally just as much as the mother. I know a few babies that nurse from the mother, but for comfort will always go to their father.
Babies are quite smart and are fully capable of bonding with multiple people, and can even assign roles to them: This person for this need, etc.
