A Lobby for Evolved Parenting
As early as 1997, Newsweek reported in a special section on early brain development that, "Early-childhood experiences exert a dramatic and precise impact, physically determining how the intricate neural circuits of the brain are wired." This revelation—that early shaping of neurobiology happens disproportionately through parenting in the early years—has left experts and parents clamoring for concrete practices to optimize that development. The cognitive stimulation idea, utilizing bright and noisy “educational toys” and videos turned out to be a multi-billion dollar misstep to this end. However, the baselines that research has revealed for optimal parenting—or Primal Parenting--offers the real answer. And parents feel in their bones that it’s right.
In founding EPI, we thought, what if this set of empirically supported parenting practices had a lobby like the commercial influences do? What if we saw press releases and news headlines that read, “Breastfeeding to six months would save the US $13 billion”? Or, “Longer maternity leave improves the longevity of women’s careers”? (Both are true.) As it’s been said so many times in reaction to countering our fast food culture, “there’s no lobby for vegetables.” But what if, right along with the profit motives of baby formula manufacturers and misguided women’s rights activists, there was a lobby for the type of parenting that best develops healthy human beings? That’s the idea behind The Evolved Parenting Initiative. Now there’s a lobby for that.
As early as 1997, Newsweek reported in a special section on early brain development that, "Early-childhood experiences exert a dramatic and precise impact, physically determining how the intricate neural circuits of the brain are wired." This revelation—that early shaping of neurobiology happens disproportionately through parenting in the early years—has left experts and parents clamoring for concrete practices to optimize that development. The cognitive stimulation idea, utilizing bright and noisy “educational toys” and videos turned out to be a multi-billion dollar misstep to this end. However, the baselines that research has revealed for optimal parenting—or Primal Parenting--offers the real answer. And parents feel in their bones that it’s right.
In founding EPI, we thought, what if this set of empirically supported parenting practices had a lobby like the commercial influences do? What if we saw press releases and news headlines that read, “Breastfeeding to six months would save the US $13 billion”? Or, “Longer maternity leave improves the longevity of women’s careers”? (Both are true.) As it’s been said so many times in reaction to countering our fast food culture, “there’s no lobby for vegetables.” But what if, right along with the profit motives of baby formula manufacturers and misguided women’s rights activists, there was a lobby for the type of parenting that best develops healthy human beings? That’s the idea behind The Evolved Parenting Initiative. Now there’s a lobby for that.