Infanticide

BACKGROUND: Postpartum psychosis, a mood disorder triggered by childbirth, is one of the most severe psychiatric conditions, with high risks of suicide and infanticide if untreated. While it is evident that genetic factors play a crucial role in disorder risk, the exact extent of their importance is yet to be determined. METHODS: This cohort study consisted of 1,633,535 birthing parents from the Swedish nationwide registers, of whom 2,489 (0·15%) experienced postpartum psychosis within three months of their first ever childbirth...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Male mammals display different paternal responses to pups, either attacking or killing the young offspring, or contrastingly, caring for them. The neural circuit mechanism underlying the between-individual variation in the pup-directed responsiveness of male mammals remains unclear. Monogamous mandarin voles were used to complete the present study. The male individuals were identified as paternal and infanticidal voles, according their behavioral responses to pups. It was found that the serotonin release in the medial preoptic area (MPOA), as well as the serotonergic neuron activity, significantly increased upon licking the pups, but showed no changes after attacking the pups, as revealed by the in vivo fiber photometry of the fluorescence signal from the 5-HT 1...

Parenting involves major behavioral transitions that are supported by coordinated neuroendocrine and physiological changes to promote the onset of novel offspring-directed behaviors. In comparison to maternal care, however, the mechanisms underlying the transition to paternal care are less understood. Male laboratory mice are predominantly infanticidal as virgins but show paternal responses 2 weeks after mating. Interestingly, males show a mating-induced surge of prolactin, which we hypothesized may be involved in initiating this behavioral transition...

The drug treatment of mental disorders during lactation requires special knowledge about the possible effects on the breastfed infant. The first part of this 2‑part article is devoted to the use of psychotropic drugs during pregnancy. This second part addresses the use of psychotropic drugs during breastfeeding.The uncertainty about whether maternal breastfeeding can be recommended during drug treatment is high and the clinical management of psychopharmacotherapy during breastfeeding is a major challenge...

BACKGROUND: Postpartum psychotic- or mood disorders are psychiatric emergencies associated with risk of suicide and infanticide. Except from case reports, there are only few descriptions of its treatment. Therefore, we aimed to describe the treatment of women admitted with postpartum psychotic- or mood disorder in Denmark with emphasis on the use of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). METHODS: We conducted a register-based cohort study of all women with incident postpartum psychotic- or mood disorder (no prior diagnoses of psychotic- or mood disorder or treatment with ECT) requiring admission in the period from 2011 to 2018...

On 20 April 2022 the Sessions Court of Greater Mumbai sentenced a postpartum depressed woman to lifetime imprisonment for abandoning and murdering her twin girl child ( In re: The State of Maharashtra ). In the absence of a diagnosis or treatment for postpartum depression at the time when the crime was committed, a plea of insanity was denied. This article considers how the absence of services for perinatal mental health in India may challenge the delivery of criminal justice in cases of infanticide.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

In many species, including mice, female animals show markedly different pup-directed behaviours based on their reproductive state1,2 . Naive wild female mice often kill pups, while lactating female mice are dedicated to pup caring3,4 . The neural mechanisms that mediate infanticide and its switch to maternal behaviours during motherhood remain unclear. Here, on the basis of the hypothesis that maternal and infanticidal behaviours are supported by distinct and competing neural circuits5,6 , we use the medial preoptic area (MPOA), a key site for maternal behaviours7-11 , as a starting point and identify three MPOA-connected brain regions that drive differential negative pup-directed behaviours...

The deliberate killing of a child by its mother is abhorrent and is associated in the minds of many with mental illness and in particular with postnatal depression. However, at least 50% of perpetrators are neither "mad" nor "bad", and mothers who kill children are not "unhinged" by pregnancy or childbirth. We propose a different explanation: "blind rage" or "overwhelmed syndrome", whereby parents, stressed to breaking point by sleep deprivation or incessant baby crying, respond by lethally harming their child contrary to previous behaviour...

AbstractOffspring desertion by parents generally occurs at an early stage of parental care, which is thought to minimize the costs of parental care prior to desertion. This study investigated the effects of endocrinological constraints on early total filial cannibalism by male Rhabdoblennius nitidus in the field, a paternal brooding blennid fish with androgen-dependent brood cycling. In brood reduction experiments, cannibal males showed low levels of plasma 11-ketotestosterone (11-KT) relative to noncannibals and also similar levels of 11-KT to males in the parental care phase...

Species with slow life history strategies that invest in few offspring with extended parental care need to adapt their behavior to cope with anthropogenic changes that occur within their lifetime. Here we show that a female chacma baboon ( Papio ursinus ) that commonly ranges within urban space in the City of Cape Town, South Africa, stops using urban space after giving birth. This change of space use occurs without any significant change in daily distance traveled or social interactions that would be expected with general risk-sensitive behavior after birth...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Robotic waste management automation systems are increasingly utilized around the globe as a user-friendly, ecological and hygienic alternative to waste disposal, simultaneously reducing the volume and frequency of waste collection. The present paper aims to report a case of death by compaction in an automated robotic waste management system and review relevant literature on compactor-related fatalities. The unusual fatal accident involved a 37-year-old male citizen who deliberately entered the robotic dumpster to retrieve his accidentally discarded medication...

Extremely female-biased sex ratios of parasitoid wasps in multiple-foundress groups challenges evolutionary theory which predicts diminishing bias as foundress numbers increase. Recent theory based on foundress cooperation has achieved qualitative rather than quantitative success in explaining bias among parasitoids in the genus Sclerodermus . Here, we develop an explanation, expanding the theory of local mate competition, based on the observation that male production seems dominated by some foundresses within groups...

We conducted the first long-term and large-scale study of demographic characteristics and reproductive behavior in a wild jaguar ( Panthera onca ) population. Data were collected through a combination of direct observations and camera trapping on a study area that operates both as a cattle ranch and ecotourism destination. Jaguars exhibited two birth peaks: April/May and October/November, that are the end and the beginning of the wet season in the Pantanal, respectively. The average litter size was 1.43 ± 0...

Parental care has evolved several times and is present across taxa. Parental care behaviors, such as food provisioning and protection, are critical for offspring success. However, infanticide can co-exist with parental care in the same species. The mechanisms underlying the switch from care to consumption and from offspring dependence to independence are relatively unknown, especially in fishes, the oldest and largest group of vertebrates. Mouthbrooding, an extreme example of parental care present in dozens of genera of fishes, provides an excellent opportunity to investigate the brain regions important for parental care...

Characterization of mentally ill maternal perpetrators of filicide assigned to a single psychiatric-forensic facility, including previous access to mental health services. A cross-sectional, retrospective analysis of medical records and legal documentation of maternal filicide patients at a single psychiatric-forensic facility (1990-2021) was performed. Socio-demographic, relationship, psychopathological, and criminological characteristics were collected. Data were compared according to previous perpetrators' access to mental health services or not and access within 1 year prior to filicide or not...

Sexually-selected infanticide by males is widespread across primates. Maternal protection is one of many infanticide avoidance strategies employed by female primates. Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus wurmbii) mothers with younger offspring are less social with males than mothers with older offspring. Additionally, the distance between a mother and offspring decreases in the presence of male conspecifics, but not female conspecifics. We hypothesized that mothers are responsible for the change in mother-offspring proximity when males are present...