Babywearing Science: Health, Cognitive, and Emotional Benefits for Baby and Mama
In this video, Jess from Modern Nurture delves into the fascinating world of babywearing. Jess shares insightful research on how babywearing benefits both parents and infants, including increased maternal responsiveness, emotional bonding, reduced infant crying, and support for breastfeeding. The video also highlights health advantages such as spinal and cranial health, physical function regulation, and benefits for preterm infants. Additionally, Jess discusses the mental health perks for mothers, including reduced postpartum depression and increased confidence. Practical benefits like hands-free convenience and effective travel with baby carriers are also covered. Join Jess as she explores these topics and invites viewers to comment if they're interested in future videos about the best baby carriers for various stages.
Babywearing Science: Health, Cognitive, and Emotional Benefits for Baby and Mama
In this video, Jess from Modern Nurture delves into the fascinating world of babywearing. Jess shares insightful research on how babywearing benefits both parents and infants, including increased maternal responsiveness, emotional bonding, reduced infant crying, and support for breastfeeding. The video also highlights health advantages such as spinal and cranial health, physical function regulation, and benefits for preterm infants. Additionally, Jess discusses the mental health perks for mothers, including reduced postpartum depression and increased confidence. Practical benefits like hands-free convenience and effective travel with baby carriers are also covered. Join Jess as she explores these topics and invites viewers to comment if they're interested in future videos about the best baby carriers for various stages.
Babywearing is such a powerful tool. In one study researchers gave at risk families, a babywearing intervention. And within three months, they were able to see that parents were more responsive to their infant cues and the babies were more likely to develop a secure attachment by their first birthday. Hey mamas. Welcome to modern nurture where mothers meet at the intersection of instincts and evidence. I'm your host, Jess. And today we are diving into the fascinating world of babywearing. I'll be sharing some interesting research and insights about how babywearing benefits both you and your little one. And before I get started, I wanted to take a minute to say that this video is in no way judging anyone who has not, or does not like to baby, wear you can be a great responsive mother without wearing your baby. Every family is different. Every baby is different. So it's all about doing what works for you. So let's get into it. Mhm. So I think most of you are probably familiar with what baby wearing is it's carrying your baby around in a sling or a wrap or some kind of device that allows you to hook your baby to you. And use your hands and go about your daily life. Um, the first benefit. I wanted to talk to you about was some research about how babywearing impacted maternal responsiveness and. I found this one. Pretty fascinating. So once study involving 23 mother infant pairs or dyads, um, researchers observed how mothers responded to their babies during play sessions in the lab. They found that mothers who practiced babywearing were much more likely to respond quickly and appropriately. To their baby's signals compared to mothers who didn't. This means that they were better at picking up on the cues and their specific baby's needs and responding in a way that actually soothed and engaged their babies. Another larger study with 492 mothers looked at how baby wearing. Influenced their beliefs about parenting. The results showed that mothers who wore their babies consistently. Valued, um, responsiveness and engagement with their babies. And. Interestingly, they manipulated in a lab, how much physical contact mothers would have with their babies. And when mothers use carriers, they had more tactile. Um, interactions with their babies and less interaction with outside objects. So this kind of tactile interaction is just critical for a bonding in the social development piece. Another big benefit of babywearing is that there has actually been a research that shows that baby wearing reduces infant crying. And I talked about this a little bit in my five S how to stop crying video. Um, It has to do with recreating the womb. Right? So research by Huntsiger and BARR found that infants who were carried more, cried, less. Specifically. Infants and the experimental group were carried more and they cried 43% less overall and 51% less during the. Evening hours, which can be a real problem for some babies. And that was compared to the control group. Babywearing also supports breastfeeding. So on one hand, it promotes keeping your baby close. So you get to really start understanding what their hunger cues are. So you end up being able to feed them. And meet their need before they end up before they have to get stressed out and cry about it. And the other cool thing is that you have your baby in the carrier, so you can really discretely feed them while you're going about tasks. Even in public, you can kind of discreetly feed them Without anyone really seeing what you're doing. There have also been studies that show that mothers who carried their babies for at least one hour a day. Ended up having significantly higher breastfeeding rates at three months and five months. Babywearing also helps to extend the duration of time that mothers tend to feed their babies. So mothers that carry their babies, where in one study, more likely at six months to be still breastfeeding. So I mentioned that developing this year, secure attachment and bonding with your baby is a big benefit of baby wearing the part that I didn't mention yet was that. That bonding actually extends through toddlerhood studies have shown that mothers who baby were, have better attachment even through toddlerhood. Let's talk health benefits of baby wearing. So one is the prevention of spinal and cranial deprivations. Babies who spend a lot of time in car seats and swings and things like that can develop. Squaring off of the cranium, they also have, can have issues with their spinal cord and postural muscles so properly carrying allows your baby to naturally develop those things. And you can see my controversial tummy time video for more on this. Maybe give me a nice comment because my Short earned me some nasty ones. Anyway, number two regulation of physical functions, babies who are held close can better regulate their breathing, their heart rate and their temperature. another benefit is reduction of reflux symptom, reflux symptoms. So keeping your infant upright can reduce things like. Vomiting and coughing and the discomfort that comes with reflux. It also promotes neural development, Close contact helps in the development of the baby's brain and other vital systems. And while we're talking about that. It also helps their social and emotional development. So having your baby. Interacting with you closely all day and being interacting with the world around them. The same world you're interacting with helps them observe how to do that. And they it's, um, wonderful for their cognitive development. Babywearing is also very effective for preterm infants. Preemies whose mothers practice kangaroo care or. Um, Basically kangaroo care is just skin to skin and baby wearing those babies grew more and gained more weight than babies whose mothers did not do kangaroo care. Baby wearing also has. Mental health benefits for the mother. So it. That close contact can promote oxytocin. And, um, I think that is what helps with reducing postpartum depression. It also. Helps. Increase mother's confidence. I think, and that goes back to the study at the beginning where mothers learn their baby's cues, that helps to start them start feeling more confident about what they're doing. Another set of benefits is really about parental convenience. So, of course babywearing keeps your hands free so you can go about whatever you're doing. Uh, like dishes, shopping, whatever it is, But. I would also say that babywearing is a huge benefit for travel. I took my baby in a carrier when we did a cross country flight and having her in the carrier. And through the airport on the airplane. She was able to nurse right there on the airplane. It was so much smoother than I think it would have been without the carrier. I think if you have, um, older kids, they probably appreciate the baby carrier too, because you have two hands to interact with them, as well as caring for your little one. Wow. Babywearing has a ton of benefits, but it can be tiring Do you know that baby wearing carrying your baby throughout the day can increase the metabolic cost by about 500 calories per day. Crazy. That's on top of the breastfeeding calories, by the way. Cause I'm pretty sure they've said 500 calories for breastfeeding as well. So no wonder we're so hungry when we have those little babies. I'd love to in future videos, dig into the best baby carriers for, um, different stages, newborn and so forth to help you guys make those decisions. So if you could help me out by commenting carrier video below. That will let me know that you're interested and it might help me get some samples so I can get a wider variety of carriers for you to check out. Thanks for watching. I really appreciate your time. I know you're all busy mamas. See you next time.
