Synonyms
Definition
Benefits of nursing
Introduction
Nursing is a crucial aspect of maternal care as it helps with the important evolutionary benefit of infant survival and growth. As such, mammals may have evolved to nurse their infants quiet intuitively, albeit bearing some costs (Noonan and Rippeyoung 2011). These costs mainly stem from the fact that mothers require adequate energy to meet both maternal and offspring needs. For instance, some mothers of species that are relatively smaller in size may face higher energy demands due to the large correlation between maternal size and milk output (Oftedal 1984). Lactation for these mothers may sometimes require energy demands that may be greater than any other time in life (Prentice and Prentice 1988). This may also be the case for species that produce large litters as these mothers would need to have enough physical resources to meet the requirements of the large litter of infants as well as for...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Hinde, K., Power, M. L., & Oftedal, O. T. (2009). Rhesus macaque milk: Magnitude, sources, and consequences of individual variation over lactation. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 138, 148–157.
Noonan, M. C., & Rippeyoung, P. L. (2011). The economic costs of breastfeeding for women. Breastfeeding Medicine, 6(5), 325–327.
Oftedal, O. T. (1984). Milk composition, milk yield and energy output at peak lactation: A comparative review. Symposia of the Zoological Society of London, 51, 33–85.
Prentice, A. M., & Prentice, A. (1988). Energy costs of lactation. Annual Review of Nutrition, 8(1), 63–79.
Rogowitz, G. L. (1996). Trade-offs in energy allocation during lactation. American Zoologist, 36(2), 197–204.
Roulin, A. (2002). Why do lactating females nurse alien offspring? A review of hypotheses and empirical evidence. Animal Behaviour, 63(2), 201–208.
Sellen, D. W. (2007). Evolution of infant and young child feeding: Implications for contemporary public health. Annual Review of Nutrition, 27, 123–148.
Trivers, R. L. (1974). Parent-offspring conflict. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 14(1), 249–264.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Franklin, P. (2019). Gathering Returns When Nursing Infants. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_400-1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_400-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-16999-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-16999-6
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Behavioral Science and PsychologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences