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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2020 Sep 1.
Published in final edited form as: J Neuroendocrinol. 2019 Jul 29;31(9):e12770. doi: 10.1111/jne.12770

FIGURE 1.

FIGURE 1

The maternal behavior neurocircuit (MBN) is comprised of two reciprocally inhibiting subsystems for: (1) maternal care, mediated by the medial preoptic area (mPOA) of hypothalamus (HYP), ventral tegmental area (VTA), nucleus accumbens (NAc) and ventral pallidum (VP), and (2) maternal defense, mediated by periaqueductal grey (PAG). These opposing subsystems are regulated by the amygdala (AMY), insula, and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC). Research from our lab and others has established that human MCN’s volumes and responses to ethologically pertinent own-baby cry correlate with adaptive parental thoughts and behaviors