The Dangers behind Cry It Out

Parents are told by doctors, sleep training books, relatives and friends to leave their babies to cry, but neuroscience tells us that this can cause lifelong damage to children. The idea for allowing a child to cry it out comes from a misunderstanding that infants know how to manipulate us. Social and emotional development will not progress normally in infants who are routinely left to cry it out. If parents were to respond to their infants in a timely manner, social and emotional development would proceed on target.


Infants need to form an attachment, based on trust, with at least one primary caregiver for social and emotional development to progress normally. An Infant learns to trust when they are responded to in a timely manner and with compassion. “The infant normally internalizes a neurobiological image of the behavioral and emotional characteristics of its caregiver that later regulates important features of its brain function” (Kraemer). Without that specific caregiver, the infant does not have one specific image to internalize. An infant needs a positive, compassionate caregiver to replicate in order to grow emotionally and socially.

Letting babies get distressed is a practice that can damage children and their relational capacities in many ways for the long term, according to Darcia Narvaez, Associate Professor of Psychology and Director of the Collaborative for Ethical Education at the University of Notre Dame. Infants who are routinely left to “cry it out” are more likely to be “anxious, uncooperative and alienated” and to grow up to be insecure (Narvaez). The emotional effects on an infant so young can dictate their emotional plain for the rest of their life.

By ignoring the needs of an infant, a caregiver is teaching the infant that it’s needs do not matter. This is going to alter the development of self esteem. The caregiver is also ignoring crucial cues. Infants give a variety of cues letting us know what they need. Infants show when they need to have a bowel movement, urinate, are too warm, too cold, or hungry in a variety of ways, each one being slightly different for each infant. If a caregiver is not looking for these cues or is ignoring these cues, they could be destroying or preventing a bond between infant and caregiver,

Infants need nurturing in order to thrive. Leaving an infant alone to cry is not nurturing. When a newborn infant is away from it’s mother, it gets distressed. When an infant is distressed, it releases the stress hormone cortisone which can damage and alter DNA as well as the neurons responsible for communication between receptors in the brain (Narvaez). In a study on rats, whose brains often react similar to humans, it was found that “If in the first 10 days of life you have low nurturing rat mother (the equivalent of the first 6 months of life in a human), the gene never gets turned on and the rat is anxious towards new situations for the rest of its life, unless drugs are administered to alleviate the anxiety. These researchers say that there are hundreds of genes affected by nurturance” (Narvaez). This study suggests that the way a caregiver treats an infant could alter, not only the infant’s DNA, but also, the DNA of the following generations and could predispose the entire family for anxiety or other emotional issues.

Infants do not cry to manipulate. They cry to communicate. At birth, infants use a variety of cues to communicate, from sounds meant to indicate hunger or movements meant to indicate the need to be held, but when these basic needs are not met, they will become increasingly agitated and will cry to indicate their distress, not to manipulate. Parents are told it is wrong to respond to their infant’s every need, but in the beginning, responding is crucial to forming a bond.

If a mother is the caregiver, her response is preprogrammed. Mother’s are biologically programmed to respond to their infant’s cries. “Upon hearing her baby cry, the blood flow to a mother’s breasts increases, accompanied by a biological urge to ‘pick up and nurse’. The act of breastfeeding itself causes a surge in prolactin , a hormone that we feel forms the biological basis of the term ‘mother’s intuition.’”, according to Dr. William Sears, the man behind the Attachment Parenting movement.

Having a bond or a secure attachment to an infant you are the sole caregiver of will have benefits for both the caregiver and the infant. Caregiver’s have lower levels of stress hormones suggesting that they are more relaxed and comfortable in their role (Dewar). Children who had secure attachments with a caregiver are more likely to score higher on intelligence tests later on (Dewar). Studies also suggest that children with secure attachments will score higher on “communication, cognitive engagement, and motivation to master new skills” later in life (Dewar).

When an infant is left alone to cry, whether in a crib or elsewhere, there are many dangers beyond emotional damage. Infants bones are not as strong as an adults and more likely to break if trapped in a crib rail, or pressed under them. Also, cribs can malfunction and harm a baby while the caregiver is ignoring the cries. The cry of pain is the same no matter what the cause, emotional or physical.

While ignoring an infant’s cry, a caregiver is conditioning themselves not to respond to the infant. This is creating a habit which can be hard to break (Narvaez). Studies suggest that establishing these habits within the first year would be the worst time as the majority of an infant’s brain is grown within that that time (Narvaez). It is during that time that the majority of damage can be done.

Infants are not brought into this world to inconvenience adults, they are here to be loved and nurtured until they grow up to be caregivers themselves. If a caregiver is patient and responsive to an infant, the infant will typically progress normally socially and emotionally. Any advice to the contrary will be damaging to a new caregiver. Social and emotional development will not progress normally in infants who are routinely left to cry it out.

            Mothers, please remember, just because you have made a mistake, it is never too late to change your parenting philosophy!