Crying and cortisol
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Topic: Crying and cortisol
Posted By: Hopes
Subject: Crying and cortisol
Date Posted: 09 April 2011 at 4:20pm
I think I miss my time at the University... I rather enjoy reading research on babies and the current theories re raising them 
Anyway, I've heard it bandied around that letting babies cry it out increases cortisol levels, which in turn harms their developing little brains. I also just read the 'Politically Incorrect Parenting' book, where Nigel Latta basically says that that's not really the case, it's often quoted by people who've done 'internet research', but he's read the actual studies to reach his conclusion. Anyone ever looked into this? I'm going to have a nosy, but if anyone has any research to share, I'd like to read it  As with anything, it's the starting that's hard, I've got to find some relevant studies before I can follow citations.-------------   
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Replies:
Posted By: kellie
Date Posted: 09 April 2011 at 5:02pm
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If you google "Brainwave trust" they are a NZ organization who have heaps of info on this subject. I went to a presentation headed by Judy Bailey a couple of years ago It was really interesting.
Edit: http://brainwave.org.nz/ - Brainwave trust ------------- 
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Posted By: High9
Date Posted: 09 April 2011 at 8:41pm
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I'd be interested too tbh! I don't 'believe' in crying it out at all as I wouldn't like to be left to cry it out myself but there have been times when DD has had a huge tantrum over something and just cried and cried and nothing will stop her and I always feel stink but she just needs to let it out iygwim! But I had heard both 'stories'. ------------- http://lilypie.com"> 
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Posted By: dd76
Date Posted: 09 April 2011 at 9:31pm
| the brainwave trust is an excellent resource, but there are some great books on the subject. "why love matters" is a more recent one which goes into brain physiology but is a fairly easy read. "dance with me in the heart"by Penny Brownlea is a nz book on similar stuff.Its such an interesting debate and i think it depends on your parenting style, and what kind of relationship/bond you want to have with your baby which side of the fense you sit on. |
Posted By: millymollymandy
Date Posted: 10 April 2011 at 8:31am
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The stuff I've read says you're dammed if you're do and dammed if you don't. Overtiredness and lack of sleep is a huge contributor to cortisol levels as well, in both parents and babies. Personaly for me sleep deprivation triggers depression and bubs is heaps happier since getting good sleep habits.
Sleepstore as a medical research paper link that looks at 50 ish studies of different sleep methods, the phsyslogical (sp) effect and the dangers of interpreted sleep on both kids and parents. Basically I think it concludes that there was no real problem with any sleep training method. |
Posted By: caliandjack
Date Posted: 10 April 2011 at 8:37am
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Most sleep methods aren't recommended for under 6 months old, maybe that's in relation to the cortisol control mechanism.
I love Nigel Latta however his expertise seems to be with children and teens, I'm not sure how well his methods and ideas translate to babies under 1. ------------- http://lilypie.com" rel="nofollow">   [/url] Angel June 2012 |
Posted By: Hopes
Date Posted: 10 April 2011 at 12:29pm
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Well, I only had a quick look yesterday, but I found two interesting studies that weren't related to crying, but looked at cortisol levels. The first was measuring prenatal cortisol levels in women - the conclusion was that women who have higher levels (i.e. are more stressed) in the last trimester tended to have 'fussier' babies. The effects leveled out after a few months, but a good reason to relax while pregnant!!!! (It was a smallish sample size, but looked good in other aspects). Kind of logical, but I was surprised it did make a significant difference.
The second looked at newborn babies production of cortisol - I only had a fleeting read over the study, and have to admit that some of the terms I was reading were a little over my head, if I was serious I'd have to do more research in the area. But the basic summary seemed to be that babies who produce high levels of cortisol in response to negative stimuli tended to be more balanced and chilled at six months - their bodies were better at responding to their environment (and the 'ooh, bad things are happening, lets make cortisol' response was an early indication that they were good at that). None of that's relevant to the topic at hand, though, but I gave up looking because I've got a reeeaaaaally slow donosaur of a computer at the moment and it didn't handle the databases well, I'm going to look again when I get my laptop back later in the week. ETA that the book did mostly deal with older kids, caliandjack, but in this section he was discussing baby sleep patterns, I think the baby in his example was six months old. ETAA - I'll check out that Sleep Store stuff, sounds good  And thanks for the link to the Brainwave trust, my computer had a hernia with their website but I'll check it out later.-------------
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Posted By: frankie
Date Posted: 10 April 2011 at 5:50pm
very interesting Hopes - let us know what else you find out when the dinosaur has been banished and the laptop is back in the land of living  ------------- http://lilypie.com" rel="nofollow">  
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Posted By: T_Rex
Date Posted: 12 April 2011 at 7:47pm
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There has been quite a bit of work done by the Liggins Institute at Auckland Medical School using sheep as models for human babies - lots of IUGR stuff, but also some cortisol stuff. Obviously it wasn't specifically CIO (ever tried to make a lamb CIO? ) but it was more about the consequences of elevated cortisol on the developing body/ brain. ------------- http://lilypie.com">  http://lilypie.com">
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Posted By: Hopes
Date Posted: 13 April 2011 at 8:49am
HAHAHA, that actually cracked me up. And thanks, I'll check that out when the dinosaur's been booted out to the garage where it belongs. -------------
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T_Rex wrote:Posted By: millymollymandy
Date Posted: 13 April 2011 at 7:38pm
| Ha, ha - I think my brother's neighbour did make a lamb CIO, didn't make for good neighbour relations. |
Posted By: Ceres
Date Posted: 13 April 2011 at 9:19pm
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I guess the difficulty with researching cortisol and CIO in particular, is that it wouldn't be ethical to run an RCT (randomised control trial) to test it thoroughly in human infants; and any observational/correlational approach would be subject to numerous confounds.
A (very) quick search though yielded a theoretical review article which is currently in press in the Sleep Medicine Reviews Journal "Behavioural sleep treatments and night time crying in infants: Challenging the status quo" by Sarah L. Blunden*, Kirrilly R. Thompson, Drew Dawson. The authors suggest that there is evidence that leaving an infants to cry for extended periods (such as in a CIO program) can increase both short and long term cortisol levels. They also say that trauma literature indicates babies left crying for large periods of time demonstrate stress, withdrawal, difficulites with attachment, and changes in neural structures have been observed. However, how long it actually takes for these changes to occur is unknown, it may take longer than a few days that a typical CIO program would occur over. The authors also stress that long-term studies, and RCTs, are really needed to answer whether CIO type training, in the short-term, can result in long-term issues. Interesting. ------------- http://lilypie.com" rel="nofollow">  http://lilypie.com" rel="nofollow">  <
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