For years, many have believed that mothers are naturally wired to hear their babies cry in the night while fathers somehow sleep through it. A new study challenges this long-standing myth, revealing it’s not about biology at all.
An all too common scenario: a mum and dad both asleep, their baby begins to cry in the middle of the night. They’re both tired, whether that be from paid employment, a day of childcare and housework, or a mix of both. One stays fast asleep, whilst the other one wakes up to take care of the baby. Can you guess who?
For years, mothers have been told that they are biologically hardwired to hear their babies cry and that fathers don’t have that same ability. It’s been a common belief that in this one scenario, men actually have a scientifically backed defence in the unequal sharing of childcare; they just can’t hear the cries! (that’s a mother’s talent). One explanation used to excuse fathers is that women are biologically more sensitive to their baby’s cry – a supposed maternal ‘talent.
This myth has since been challenged, with a study from Aarhus University finding that men hear their babies crying loudly just as much as women can. The reasons for not getting up, therefore, cannot be put down to some sort of mother’s intuition or super hearing. So, is this myth just a reinforcement of gender stereotypes and what a mother should do?
The study that disproved the myth
The 2025 Aarhus University study revealed that there is only a minimal difference in how men and women respond to nighttime crying. Whilst women are slightly more responsive to very quiet sounds, when the volume was increased, there was no significant difference between men and women (this was not just with a baby’s cry). Not only this, but the study also showed that mothers were three times more likely to handle nighttime infant care than fathers, and the minimal hearing difference could not account for this gap. Without biological differences being a valid explanation for the difference in nighttime childcare, it seems that social factors offer more of a truthful explanation.
Unequal caregiving and domestic contributions
As the study shows, women do more nighttime childcare than men. The idea that women do more childcare than men has been proven in studies over and over across the years. Despite there being an increase in men taking part in caring responsibilities and domestic contributions (e.g. cleaning, laundry, etc), women still end up doing the bulk of this sort of work.
This ‘woman’s load’ has been shown to only compound when children are part of the family, widening the gap between men and women despite sharing of responsibilities being more equal before children. The Centre for Progressive Policy found that women are providing 23.3 billion hours of unpaid childcare per year, with men providing just 9.7 billion hours. This, combined with women doing most of the unpaid housework in the home, is no wonder that women are doing most of the nighttime care.
A womans nature
Women carry this emotional labour of being the one to do more housework and childcare without kicking up a fuss and doing so with their own initiative, as even challenging her partner adds to the mental weight she carries. For a man to ask what needs doing in the house, checking details about childcare, or even saying ‘I’ve done the washing up’, all put the responsibility of these things into the woman’s hands and mind. She is the one who is truly responsible.
This responsibility has been ingrained into men and women’s minds to be a mother’s nature, through common beliefs of women’s natural maternal and caring instincts, resulting in the care and emotional labour they give being undervalued, as it’s seen to be just a part of their nature to be that way.
Martha Fineman argues that the family unit is ‘the most gendered institution in society’, with the family being constructed through gendered norms. Implementing equality into this private space is largely down to choice. This choice couples have to make to equally share childcare is not as simple as desiring to do so. With both parties of the couple having ingrained gender norms, it makes sense that these natural and instinctive expectations put onto women influence society’s expectations on the mother, and the mother’s expectations she has for herself. The care she gives is then undervalued, as it is expected to be free and without complaint.
The idea of childcare being undervalued isn’t only exclusive to the family unit, but also with nursery workers (mostly a female profession) being paid some of the lowest in society. Yet, this work, either paid in the workplace or unpaid at home, is essential in society and the market to exist.
The workplace
The workplace has enacted equality between men and women in many ways, with the same pay between men and women and equality laws. However, there are still issues with the workplace not truly being equal, with one of them being the absence of adapting to a childcare-friendly workplace.
Similar to how the family was constructed through gendered norms, as was the workplace, with men who are able to work 9 to 5 without childcare responsibilities being the model that it was based upon. There have since been adaptations with women entering the workplace, such as maternity leave, but the issue of childcare causing difficulties for both parties is still prevalent and ends up affecting women disproportionately.
As discussed, despite men and women attempting to share housework, when a child enters the family, it ends up being the woman doing most of the housework and childcare. With the family unit being historically developed in the traditional circumstances of breadwinner and caregiver, it is no wonder that there ends up being a primary caregiver who leaves the workplace for a period of time or adapts their hours to fit in childcare. This caregiver tends to be the mothers, and she suffers emotionally and economically because of it.
Another component of this is the maternity versus paternity leave difference. In the UK, it is the mother’s responsibility to transfer any of her leave to the father for shared parental leave, once again putting the responsibility of equal childcare into the mother’s hands. Not only this, but there is actually little take-up of shared parental leave. The standard paternity leave is only 1 – 2 weeks of pay, versus 39 weeks paid for women.
Paternal involvement in childcare is important in a mother’s return to work; the Aarhus University study theorised that the difference in maternity and paternity leave could be affecting the nighttime childcare sharing, with mothers being used to the routine more than the fathers.
So why don’t dads wake up to their babies’ cries? It’s not a hearing issue, nor a mother’s nature or intuition. It is another symptom of ingrained gender norms and expectations.
How can this change?
There is no simple solution to make childcare simpler, with generations of gender norms internalised within us, it’s in the workplace, it’s in the family, and it’s in the media. But if maternity and paternity leave can affect the difference in nighttime care, then attitudes and laws around dads taking time off work should change, with less responsibility being put on the mum, it would be a step in the right direction.
