Do parents with extra help goof off?
By Susan Milius
A mere human might slack off on the baby care if a nanny suddenly materialized, but a test of house sparrows has found the opposite reaction.
Douglas W. Mock of the University of Oklahoma in Norman compares the experiment to the 1950s television show The Millionaire. It featured stories of people who, out of the blue, received a million dollars from the show’s fictional philanthropist. Much of the drama, Mock points out, came from the recipients’ lives falling apart.