Got IQ?
One of the most distressing of the potential benefits of breastfeeding—that it increases IQ in the breastfed child—has been refuted in this new study.Though breast milk has been proven beneficial for child and mother’s heath, it’s nice to know that the tricky issue of intelligence can be left out of the equation. The whole notion of making your child “smarter” with every let-down or, worse, withholding IQ points by not breastfeeding (for whatever reason) can get new parents off to an unnecessarily competitive and insecure start.
Of course mom is still to blame if the kid turns out to be a dullard: this study also suggests that a child's IQ is more determined by maternal IQ than anything else. I guess that means all the breastfeeding in the world will not save my son from a C- in geometry.
in baby | breastfeeding
