Baby's sex: Can parents choose? The short answer is no — there's not much the average couple can do to affect a baby's sex. A 2008 study found that women who ate breakfast cereal daily around the time of conception were more likely to conceive boys, but some scientists question the study's method of analysis.
Countless old wives' tales suggest that everything from a woman's diet to sexual position during conception can affect a baby's sex, but these theories remain unproved. Likewise, researchers have found that timing sex in relation to ovulation — such as having sex days before ovulation to conceive a boy or closer to ovulation to conceive a girl — doesn't work.
Rarely, couples face the agonizing problem of knowing they could pass a genetic trait to a child of a specific sex — usually a boy. Under those special circumstances couples may use expensive, high-tech interventions to influence the chance of conceiving a girl. For example...
