DOI: 10.1192/bjp.2026.10870 ISSN: 0007-1250

It takes a village to raise a child: how evolutionary anthropology can inform perinatal psychiatry

Annie Swanepoel, Bosky Nair, Nikhil Chaudhary

Summary

A significant minority of women experience perinatal depressive or anxiety disorders, perhaps because mothers now attempt in isolation a role humans evolved to perform collectively. We argue that this evolutionary mismatch may be one contributing factor, complementing their multifactorial, biopsychosocial aetiology. We outline clinical, service and policy implications.

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