Can Your Belly Tell You If It Is a Boy or Girl? 生男生女 ── 肚皮露玄機？

\Many myths surround the mysteries of pregnancy. For example, people have developed a lot of folk wisdom about predicting a baby's sex. One old wives' tale that has endured is that if a woman carries her unborn baby low, then it will be a boy. Actually, the shape and height of a woman' belly during pregnancy is determined by her muscle tone and the position the baby is in.

Another myth surrounding the sex of a baby says that curvy women have girls and less curvy women have boys. The reasoning behind this is that less curvy women are thought to have higher levels of the male hormone, testosterone. However, a recent study found no connection between a mother's waist-to-hip ratio and her infant's gender.

While old beliefs may be interesting and fun to talk about, there is only one accurate way to predict a baby's sex: by getting an ultrasound done.

圍繞著懷孕的種種現象有許多神話。比方說，人們發現了民間很多預測胎兒性別的妙法。根據一則流傳至今的老婦人的故事，如果孕婦腹中胎兒的位置較低，那么就會是個男孩。不過實際上，孕婦肚子在懷孕期間的形狀及高度是取決于孕婦腹肌的緊實度及腹中胎兒的胎位。

另一個與胎兒性別有關的神話是：腰、臀間曲線明顯的婦女會生女孩；反之，曲線較不明顯的則會生男孩。這種說法的論據是人們認為曲線較不明顯的婦女具有較多的男性荷爾蒙──睪丸素酮。不過最近的一項研究表明，母親的腰、臀比例和嬰兒的性別沒有關系。

老祖先的看法或許很有趣，說起來也挺有意思，不過能準確預測胎兒性別的方法卻只有一個：用超聲波掃描。