Exercise Through Pregnancy to Boost Baby's IQ

Like most moms, I think my children are pretty smart, but now research has proven that the exercise I did while pregnant may have boosted their intelligence.

"Children whose mother exercised 30 minutes a day score around eight points higher on standard IQ tests than children whose mothers were more sedentary," says psychologist Richard E. Nisbett, author of Intelligence and How to Get It.

Nisbett specifically credits exercising large muscle groups with increasing the growth of neurons and adding to the brain's blood supply.

While research has already proven that breastfeeding boost IQ levels, Nisbett says that if a mother exercises throughout her pregnancy and then breastfeeds for at least nine months, she can help raise her child's IQ by about 14 points.

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The author told the Timesonline.co.uk that mothers--not fathers--have the biggest influence on a child's intellectual development. "But the mother is the most important IQ agent here. In families dominated by a father, there are higher mathematical skills but that’s all we contribute, I’m afraid."