Many of the young expectant mothers who practice taijiao believe the rigorous programs of stimulation currently in fashion are a 20th century Western invention.

However, according to the how-to books on taijiao crowding the

Mothers-to-be take a prenatal training class in Wuhan, Hubei Province.

shelves of Beijing bookstores, the concept itself dates from the Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220) and is mentioned in many classic texts of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) such as the Classic of Internal Medicine (Huangdi Neijing).

In these classics, the theory of taijiao is that the mother's mood, thoughts, speech and actions are just as influential as her nutrition and physical well-being in determining the health, intelligence and character of the future child. Like most TCM advice, the precepts of taijiao advise keeping balance in temperature and food consumption and maintaining a peaceful environment.

What sets apart old taijiao from new is the new active and programmatic features. The new taijiao regimens laid out in popular prenatal care manuals advocate not just sitting in a beautiful garden, but verbally describing the flowers and trees to the fetus to promote early language development; not just listening to music but listening to an hour of Mozart every day; not just reading but reading essays designed to stimulate happiness aloud to the fetus; not just physical activity, but doing prenatal yoga and tracing patterns on the belly with a flashlight to stimulate the fetus' sense of vision; not just eating well, but taking vitamins and DHA supplements.

In its most extreme form, taijiao advocates teaching specific content, such as a song or vocabulary to the fetus so the baby will be already be learned by birth.

Some taijiao manuals are cautious to the extreme and advocate starting physical, emotional and environmental preparations for pregnancy as long as a year before; some go even earlier than the fetus, and maintain that fathers who wear tight pants can cause damage to sperm that results in birth defects.

(China Daily August 22, 2007)