Breastfeeding Eases Childhood Stress

Breastfed babies may be better equipped to deal with stress later in life than bottle-fed ones.

Breastfed babies may be better equipped to deal with stress later in life than bottle-fed ones. Researchers studied children who were between 5 and 10 years old when their parents separated or divorced and found that those who'd been breastfed were only half as likely to be highly anxious as those who'd been bottle-fed. Breastfeeding may build resilience against stress by encouraging bonding between mom and baby and aiding the development of neural and hormonal pathways that control the stress response, says Scott M. Montgomery, Ph.D., associate professor of clinical epidemiology at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.