Father's Recognition of Their Newborns by Visual-Facial and Olfactory Cues

The experiments revealed that fathers recognize their newborns from visual-facial information at early postpartum but were inconclusive regarding fathers' recognition using olfactory cues. In Experiment 1, 31 fathers tried to choose their newborns from 6 photographs. Sixty-seven percent of fathers with at least 10 min exposure ( M = 85 min) identified their newborns. Those with less than 10 min of exposure ( M = 5 min) were less successful. In Experiment 2, 81 fathers were unable to identify their newborns from 2 others at significant levels after smelling the infants' heads. This performance characterized fathers regardless of the amount of previous hands-on contact with their newborns. These findings are discussed within the broader contexts of paternal capacities for newborn recognition and bonding.