No you investigate because a baby crying might mean something's happening you need to know about. It's like an alarm call. That doesn't meant you actually about the baby.
If you hear people shouting in the street that will also get your attention.
Some cries are just annoying.
Some are very compelling.
Some are a bit fake
Some are just non-verbal moaning.
Some are heartfelt.
Some are heart wrenching.
At a kids party we went to last year a little girl wearing a fancy dress cat outfit got the elastic tail stuck as she slide down a slide only for the elastic to release as she reached the bottom and whack her across the lower back.
Now THAT crying had every parent in the place running over and wanting to do something. Before they'd even thought about it or realised it wasn't their kid.
It was horrible.
Conversely I can quite easily ignore some crying from my very own daughter if I think she's just doing it because things haven't gone her way.
Trends in brain activity don't mean there aren't exceptions, and you can train your brain to notice/ignore ambient disturbances while sleeping that you previously disregarded.
I can kind of buy the idea that there is a specific instinct/brain function/whatever involved in caring for babies though, because I am naturally caring towards almost everyone/everything else, but can't stand babies. I find even a visibly angry, growling, barking 200 pound molosser adorable, but if a baby cries all I can think is 'SHUT UP YOU ANNOYING TWIT'. I seem to have just that one thing missing.
Kind of how the brain has specific recognition software for faces, and if that is faulty you have a condition called prosopagnosia, yet people with this condition can recognize other non-sentient objects just fine.
I think the thing with baby crying is that it works in two ways. It illicits a particular kind of response from kin - usual concern or at least interest , but an altogether different one in other folks - probably annoyance of some sort.
That works fine from a babies perspective. In either case they are going to get what they want - attention. For the vast majority of our history even non kin folks would have been very, very closely socially related to the child's parents, so all good.
Now things are different, of course.
paul.
oh, and John, I can actually speak a little bit of French, by no means fluent, but enough to keep up with the small fry at the moment most of the time. The problem we are having is with the language that they are busily constructing BETWEEN English and French. It's got elements of both, but is neither. It can happen in kids from bi-lingual (or more) backgrounds. They usually stop doing it because they have no one to speak to in the creole, but in our case they have their very own tiny community.
I'm sure you where but again where children are concerned I take much of what is stated, often by people without children, with a pinch of salt. After all they change their minds with remarkable regularity.
I know how I and my wife changed pretty much within days of our roles reversing.
I don't think its a man thing but a person thing. If you don't need to hear the baby you tend not to?
I'd like to know whether they tested people where the man is the primary carer
This! It's like all groups at the extremes of issues. The people that join them are often a bunch of self-righteous, agenda-pushing, arrogant, intolerant, nutjobs. As someone who doesn't want children, those groups make me embarrassed, ashamed and very angry when I read the vitriolic rants they go on. I don't feel the need to identify myself as 'child-free'. I don't need to belong to a 'support' group for an issue like that. I have made my decision and am happy with it. I don't need to belong to a back-slapping organisation of bad attitude folks to justify it.
As the world's most fertile Mitch I think it's only fair to warn you that you can get pregnant from posting in this thread with me, such is the power of my potency.
I do apologise, without the little snippets of humour I can find and place here my head is likely to explode so you'll just have go bear with me until I can find a building high enough