Myths in Parenting - You Cannot Spoil A Baby

Dads. Bad advice about parenting can be dangerous, especially when you want to positively impact your child's development. One of the worst pieces of advice someone can give a new dad or mom is that you are "spoiling:" the baby. This is a concept that is not only wrong, but extremely dangerous.

Spoiling is a theory based on convenience for the parent to rest and not be stressed. A perception that rarely helps a parent sleep or feel less stressed. The first year of birth is a year of change, and you will lose sleep with our without this strategy. The most common theme for the "spoiling" theory is picking up an infant during times of duress. For example, picking up your child when crying is a common time for this kind of advice. People will tell you that picking up a crying infant is spoiling them. Somehow, later on in life there is a price to pay for doing this.

Seriously, let's look at this logically. Do you remember your mom or dad picking you up when you were 6 months old? Of course not. The ability for us to feel "spoiled" or comprehend such a concept is just not plausible as an infant.

Learning is another reason to avoid this theory. What can an infant learn if isolated from their parents for long periods of time. Infant brain development relies on parent child interaction. Think about how you learn as an adult through social interactions. The same is true for developing infants. They learn language, expressions, and independence through your caring attention to their needs.

It is important for new to dads to realize that the "spoiling" theory is doing the opposite that their proponents suggest. Picking up your baby improves their ability to attach and bond. This is what will impact their lives the most when they become adults. Trust is built, because an infant is reaching out to you and communicating through crying. Not responding is causing more stress, not less for an infant.

The same is true for other spoiling theories.... Allowing a baby to fall asleep in your arms versus letting them cry it out is a common one. Again, attachment and bonding. Your child wants you for comfort, and safety. Trust is impacted by your responses over time.

Spoiling a baby is outdated. Take the time to provide warmth, and love to a child. The research is conclusive. Here is some evidence from Psychology Today to help better understand the opportunities that happen when you pick up a child:


1. Talk to them.  The richer the language environment an infant experiences, the larger their vocabulary, the higher their intelligence, and the easier time they will have in school.  Preschoolers growing up in poverty hear fewer than half as many words per day and essentially live in a language desert (link is external).  It's one of the major barriers they experience blocking high achievement.  There's no reason for it.

• Talk to your newborn about anything - their cute toes, the Super Bowl, the stock market, The Girl With The Dragon Tatoo.  It doesn't matter.  What matters is language.  And no, radio or tv just aren't the same.  It's YOU.

• Talk to your toddler about their environment.  Look at the GREEN brocolli, the ROUND YELLOW grapefruit, the SQUARE box.  The BUS, the BLUE JAY, the BROWN DOGGIE.  Tell them you're cooking SIX HOT DOGS.  Listening to others is how kids start kingergarten knowing how to count and knowing their shapes and colors. It's never too early to start.

• Read, read, read.  One of the wonderful things about reading to your child is that you can read them all sorts of words that it will take years for them to be able to read themselves.  Kids will soak up long fun words as easily as single-syllables. 

2. Play ping pong.  Urie Bronfenbrenner, co-founder of Head Start, called the complicated interchange between babies and parents 'ping pong'.  The baby smiles, the mother smiles back.  The baby sticks out his tongue.  So does mom.  Those interchanges are the foundation of language (conversational turn-taking) and establish a pattern of coordinated behavior that provides a strong foundation for good attachment and sensitive caretaking.

• When your baby looks into your eyes, talk.   Babies have very few ways to control their environment.  One of them is through their gaze.  When they look at you, they want you to react.  Talk. Raise your eyebrows.  Stick out your tongue.

• When they look away, stop.  They're excited and need to calm themselves down. Or they saw something else interesting.  Or they got so excited they lost muscle control and need the time to find you again.  DON'T force yourself back in their vision.  Trust them.  They'll look back at you. 

• Peek-a-boo.  This is an extended game of ping pong for babies a bit beyond newborn, and they love it.  They're surprised at the safe predictability.  Give in to the moment. 

• Don't stop for toddlers.  Make a face or a popping noise every time they look at you.  Roll a ball back and forth.  Take turns tickling each other.  Follow their lead.  Let THEM control when you stop and when they take a break.   

3. Pick up your baby when they cry.   Study after study shows that no sound is more aversive than a crying baby.  Why does every fiber in your being want that baby to be quiet?  Because evolution has designed us to pick up crying babies.  And designed them to cry when they need us.

• The faster you pick up an infant, the more independent toddlers they become.  In the height of behaviorism, when many child developmentalists believed all aspects of infant behavior was determined by reward and punishment, Eleanor Maccoby did a great study.  She measured how long it took for mothers to respond to infant cries and followed these mother-child dyads for several years.

• The faster moms picked up infants, the less babies cried.
• Babies who were picked up fast grew up to be the most independent and curious toddlers.
• Competent babies know how to get people to fulfill their needs - they cry and then they smile when someone comes.
• Competent toddlers know how to explore the world - they use their loved ones as a safe base from which to explore.