Flawed Sleep-Training Study Makes Invalid Claims In the News

"Though the authors provide a rationale for sleep training by citing adverse consequences of parents deprived of sleep, they do not offer the alternative perspective of how babies’ systems are regulated by the caregiver’s physical presence throughout the day and at night. Nor do they bring in the broader baseline of human evolution over millions of years. According to our evolutionary baseline, babies who are left alone to sleep is abnormal, unhealthy and dangerous. Such an understanding would prompt alternatives to advocating sleep training with poorly-wrought studies like this one and instead push for changes in policies and institutions (e.g., extensive paid parental leave) to make it possible for parents to stay with children as they learn to sleep on their own without coercion." ~ Darcia Narvaez, PhD, Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame, study critique with primary author Mary Phillips, Associate Professor of Developmental Psychology in Virginia for Kindred Media