Over the past four months, my husband has outdone me in the diaper-changing tally. Of course, it’s not a competition, but if it were, we’d both win. How can I lose if he’s changing diapers, fetching toys, recording giggles and wiping sour milk from our baby’s little fat cracks?

Dads matter. They matter to moms and they matter to kids. Dads may even have been key to our humanity.

Anthropologist Lee T. Gettler hypothesizes that paternal involvement in prehistoric families allowed us to evolve into larger, more energy-efficient creatures. Pre-humans were also able to have more children because a father’s contributions meant a woman needed less time between kids, he adds. Gettler’s point is that he believes dad involvement is not a recent development and that it’s been beneficial not only to families, but to the species.

Comments are closed