Dominance, Politics, and Physiology: Voters' Testosterone Changes on the Night of the 2008 United States Presidential Election

BACKGROUND: Political elections are dominance competitions. When men win a dominance competition, their testosterone levels rise or remain stable to resist a circadian decline; and when they lose, their testosterone levels fall. However, it is unknown whether this pattern of testosterone change extends beyond interpersonal competitions to the vicarious experience of winning or losing in the context of political elections. Women's testosterone responses to dominance competition outcomes are understudied, and to date, a clear pattern of testosterone changes in response to winning and losing dominance competitions has not emerged. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The present study investigated voters' testosterone responses to the outcome of the 2008 United States Presidential election. 183 participants provided multiple saliva samples before and after the winner was announced on Election Night. The results show that male Barack Obama voters (winners) had stable post-outcome testosterone levels, whereas testosterone levels dropped in male John McCain and Robert Barr voters (losers). There were no significant effects in female voters. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The findings indicate that male voters exhibit biological responses to the realignment of a country's dominance hierarchy as if they participated in an interpersonal dominance contest

Individual Variation in Fathers’ Testosterone Reactivity to Infant Distress Predicts Parenting Behaviors with their 1-Year-Old Infants

Positive father involvement is associated with positive child outcomes. There is great variation in fathers’ involvement and fathering behaviors, and men’s testosterone (T) has been proposed as a potential biological contributor to paternal involvement. Previous studies investigating testosterone changes in response to father-infant interactions or exposure to infant cues are unclear as to whether individual variation in T is predictive of fathering behavior. We show that individual variation in fathers’ T reactivity to their infants during a challenging laboratory paradigm (Strange Situation) uniquely predicted fathers’ positive parenting behaviors during a subsequent father-infant interaction, in addition to other psychosocial determinants of paternal involvement, such as dispositional empathy and marital quality. The findings have implications for understanding fathering behaviors and how fathers can contribute to their children’s socioemotional development

Is one secure attachment enough? Infant cortisol reactivity and the security of infant-mother and infant-father attachments at the end of the first year

Attachment security is theorized to shape stress reactivity, but extant work has failed to find consistent links between attachment security to mothers and infant cortisol reactivity. We examined family configurations of infant-mother and infant-father attachment security in relation to infant cortisol reactivity. One-year old infants (N = 180) participated in the Strange Situation with mothers and fathers in two counterbalanced lab visits, one month apart (12 and 13 months). Infants with secure attachments only to their fathers and not their mothers had higher cortisol levels than infants with a secure attachment to mother and also exhibited a blunted cortisol response (high at baseline and then a decrease after stress). Results suggest that a secure attachment to father may not be enough to reduce infant stress reactivity when the infant-mother attachment is insecure, and future research is needed to uncover the family dynamics that underlie different family configurations of attachment security

Adult attachment and testosterone reactivity: Fathers\u27 avoidance predicts changes in testosterone during the strange situation procedure

We assessed parents\u27 testosterone reactivity to the Strange Situation Procedure (SSP), a moderately stressful parent-infant interaction task that pulls for parental nurturance and caregiving behavior. Parents (146 mothers, 154 fathers) interacted with their 1-year-old infants, and saliva samples were obtained pre- and post-task to assess changes in testosterone. We examined whether testosterone reactivity differed between mothers and fathers, the extent to which parents\u27 characteristic approaches to closeness (i.e., adult attachment orientation) contributed to testosterone changes, and whether any influences of adult attachment orientation were independent of more general personality characteristics (i.e., the Big Five personality dimensions). Results revealed that mothers and fathers showed comparable declines in testosterone during the SSP, and that these declines were attenuated among fathers with a more avoidant attachment orientation (i.e., those less comfortable with closeness). Associations between fathers\u27 avoidance and testosterone reactivity were statistically independent of broader personality traits. Our findings provide some of the first evidence for short-term changes in both mothers\u27 and fathers\u27 testosterone in contexts that pull for nurturance. Moreover, these findings demonstrate that individual differences in adult attachment may play an important role in understanding such changes. We discuss possible explanations for gender differences in associations between adult attachment and parents\u27 testosterone reactivity, and the extent to which testosterone reactivity might be sensitive to changes in context for mothers versus fathers

Individual Variation in Fathers’ Testosterone Reactivity to Infant Distress Predicts Parenting Behaviors with their 1-Year-Old Infants

Positive father involvement is associated with positive child outcomes. There is great variation in fathers’ involvement and fathering behaviors, and men’s testosterone (T) has been proposed as a potential biological contributor to paternal involvement. Previous studies investigating testosterone changes in response to father-infant interactions or exposure to infant cues are unclear as to whether individual variation in T is predictive of fathering behavior. We show that individual variation in fathers’ T reactivity to their infants during a challenging laboratory paradigm (Strange Situation) uniquely predicted fathers’ positive parenting behaviors during a subsequent father-infant interaction, in addition to other psychosocial determinants of paternal involvement, such as dispositional empathy and marital quality. The findings have implications for understanding fathering behaviors and how fathers can contribute to their children’s socioemotional development

Testosterone changes on election night.

<p>Time-course of salivary testosterone (in pg/mL) in U.S. Presidential election voters on November 4^th, 2008. In Panels A & C, times depicted correspond to T1 through T4 as described in the paper. Testosterone residual change scores from T1 to T4 in men (Panel B) and women (Panel D) who voted for the winner (Obama) or the losers (McCain or Barr).</p

Sample characteristics for salivary testosterone (in pg/mL).

<p>Sample characteristics for salivary testosterone (in pg/mL).</p