No. 6, November-December 1996, pp. The biocultural model is useful for understanding breastfeeding and helping mothers to breastfeed. This model comes from anthropology, the social science which studies the relationship between biology and culture.
Culture is defined by anthropologists as a people's way of life.
Anthropologists consider humans to be biological organisms who constantly adapt to and modify their environment through culture. For years, anthropologists have been collecting data on breastfeeding, but their findings have been largely ignored. Medical researchers studied every milk-producing mammal except for Homo sapiens. Timeless and Trustworthy Anthropologists maintain that a process which has nourished human children since the earliest known humans must work and have advantages for mothers, infants, and the whole species. Such a process deserves respect.