While many pregnant women and women right after birth report what experts call a “degree of subjective memory loss,” science doesn’t support the idea that motherhood is “wrought with memory deficits and is characterized by a brain that no longer functions well.”
So-called “mommy brain” or “momnesia” and other motherhood-related terms are both inaccurate and pejorative, according to a viewpoint piece this week in the journal JAMA Neurology that says science doesn’t support the concept that motherhood creates memory deficit.
“While complaints of mental fogginess should be taken seriously, it is likely the inescapable narrative of mommy brain contributes to these subjective reports, focusing pregnant women’s (and researchers’) attention on what may be a small decrease in particular aspects of cognitive function, while at the same time ignoring the faculties that are gained during this period of life,” write Clare McCormack of New York University’s Langone Medical Center, Bridget L. Callaghan of University of California Los Angeles and Jodi L. Pawluski of University Rennes in France.
In other words, women have heard “mommy brain” and “momnesia” so much they may consider even the most normal memory lapse a sign of pregnancy’s impact on the brain — in much the same way that an older person who misplaces the car keys may worry it’s a sign of age, though such memory lapses are not uncommon at any age.
The article’s authors say that a small number of studies that have tried to look at pregnancy and postpartum memory loss “have failed to find significant differences in the abilities of women who have children compared to women without children,” as CNN reported.
For instance, a 2020 Purdue University-led study in Current Psychology found new mothers as attentive as non-mothers, suggesting the mommy-brain concept “may be a culture-bound phenomenon,” as News24.com put it. And while mothers and non-mothers were similar on some measures, mothers outperformed their non-parenting peers on executive control attention.
McCormack, Callaghan and Pawluski suggest that studies don’t find what so many women report simply because labs and study settings are calm, while caring for a new baby is not. Throw in a little sleep deprivation from pregnancy or a recent birth and it’s likely no surprise that women feel a bit rattled.
According to CNN, “In attempting to find the supposed loss in brain function women may experience after having children, they may be missing the remarkable adaptation and reshaping of neural connections happening in women’s brains to prepare them for the enormous task that is parenting.”
According to the JAMA Neurology report, when mothers are tested on parenting tasks, it’s clear their long-term memory has improved and they learn quickly.