“Pregnant Women Get Baby-Brain"
Throughout gestation, the mother-to-be’s brain changes. Some brain structures physically shrink, to make way for enhanced empathy and facial recognition.
During pregnancy and the so- called "neonatal" period immediately after birth, new mothers can often seem a little confused or forgetful. A myth?
Maybe not: scientists have made brain scans of women before, during, and after pregnancy, focusing on the grey areas of the brain, in which brain cell cores function as a kind of "mission control" for the rest of the brain. Scientists observed that several of the women’s grey areas shrunk during pregnancy. The hippocampus –the centre of memory – shrinks, which could explain why some women become more forgetful after giving birth. Moreover, areas related to our social capabilities and relationships with other people shrunk.
According to scientists, the grey areas shrink, because the white areas of the brain grow equivalently larger. In the white matter, you will find brain cell links, which probably improve their electric communication during pregnancy. This means that new mothers’ brains are probably optimised to bond with their offspring and understand the needs of their children.