What is Natural or Attachment Parenting?
“Attachment parenting is about listening to your “natural instincts as a mother and your instincts will NEVER fail you, just listen to them. Letting your child know you respect their desire to communicate (which is what crying most often is), that you understand they need something (perhaps just not to be alone) and that you are there for them is a fantastic gift to give them now and something to build on for their whole lives.” (Lisa, mother of 1)
Attached or natural parenting is based on the understanding that secure attachment in early childhood is essential for the development of mature, empathetic adults. Research from a range of fields, from neuroscience to psychology to genetics, now demonstrates that responding to children’s emotional as well as physical needs at each stage of development creates emotionally secure individuals.
"Attachment parenting is not just another phase or parenting trend, amongst an array of options. Attached parenting is what babies were born biologically expecting and when they don't get it there are negative consequences. The reasons people practice detached parenting doesn't change the result for the child.” (Sam, mother of 3)
Attachment parenting creates the physical and emotional setting that allows for a healthy attachment which is essential at a time when children’s brains are still growing. “From late pregnancy through the second year of life, the human brain experiences a critical period of accelerated growth. Therefore the expanding brain is directly influenced by its environment. Stress impairs optimal brain development while healthy attachment promotes it” (Source). A healthy attachment “begins with being open to the cues of your baby/child, without fretting about spoiling them or being manipulated. …You help her feel right by setting the conditions that promote the best behavior. The child who feels right acts right” (Source).
Other expressions used to describe this approach are attachment parenting, aware parenting, instinctive parenting, conscious parenting/living and continuum parenting.
Natural parenting practices
The main touchstones of Natural Parenting are:
emotional support for mother during pregnancy
gentle childbirth methods
home-birthing or ‘rooming-in' at hospital
on-demand breastfeeding & extended breastfeeding (or child-led weaning),
responsiveness to babies cries (no controlled crying/comforting or baby 'training')
co-sleeping (bed sharing)
baby-wearing (carrying babies & toddlers in a sling)
fathers/partners who attend childbirth and share in the nurturance through all stages of childhood
strong, rather than coercive or permissive boundary setting
empathetic listening and avoidance of punishment and rewards (Source)
Sydney Psychologist Robin Grille explains that natural parents have made a shift away from previous authoritarian parenting methods as “we are increasingly coming to believe that babies know when they are hungry, how much they need to consume, when they are tired, when they need to be held, and when they need engagement or attention. A baby’s cry, no longer thought to be capricious or meaningless, is warmly attended to without delay. It is the baby’s natural biological and emotional cycles, not the clock on the wall, that govern the ebb and flow of nurturance - and the carer is led by the baby’s cues” (Source).
Significantly, "natural parents have learned to distinguish more clearly between the child’s need and the adult’s wishes" (Source) and so do not strive for a ‘good’ baby who will breastfeed every 4 hours, fall sleep alone and sleep through the night. It is a challenge, however, to resist this ideal in a society that fears babies’ dependency and "warns against yielding to babies’ and toddlers’ need to be held and comforted to sleep [for example], lest they become habitually attached” (Source). We now know that responding faithfully and immediately to small children’s needs fosters security. This "security creates independence" (Source).
For a fascinating look at a compelling analysis of how natural parenting approaches help create confident and emotionally mature adults read Parenting for a Peaceful World (2005) by Robin Grille.
Robin Grille's second book, Heart To Heart Parenting (2008) aims to help you create a deep and lasting relationship that is unique to you and your child. Using techniques that are based on connection rather than shaming, manipulation and punishment, Grille introduces you to insightful and practical ways to benefit your child's emotional well-being and social development (Source).
Caring for our planet
Some ‘natural parents’ also strive to be aware of our place on a fragile planet, because the way we consume affects not only the health of our family and community but also that of future generations. Strategies to improve our health and reduce our impact on the environment include use of natural therapies, cloth and biodegradable nappies, consuming organic food and living in a chemical free home.
Listening to your child and your instincts rather than the experts
In modern societies we are encouraged to trust experts and technology rather than our instincts. By thinking about the way human beings have evolved we are reminded that:
When supported appropriately women have the capacity to birth naturally and spontaneously
Breastfeeding provides all baby’s nutritional needs
Toddlers know when they are ready to give up breastfeeding and this physical connection with their mother
Breastfeeding is a wonderful way to soothe a toddler who is frightened by his new found independence
Sleeping and breastfeeding come more easily to a mother and baby who sleep side by side
Carrying a baby in a sling makes babies happier and life easier for mother/carer. It also promotes optimal physical and emotional development
A “child who trusts you to meet her needs will trust you to set her limits” (Source)
Babies cry to communicate. A prompt response does not imply that the carer is being manipulated or that the baby will be ‘spoiled’. Crying communicates anger, fear, confusion and releases tension.
A dependent child is not created by extended breastfeeding, carrying your baby/toddler, co-sleeping and responding to babies cries. Rather, these activities generate high self esteem in the child in the knowledge that “Someone listens to me and wants to be with me, therefore I am worthwhile” (Source)
Validating children’s physical and emotional pain fosters confidence, not weakness, as the child learns that it is not shameful to ask for help or to express feelings
Feeding families whole foods provides the nutrients needed for optimal physical and emotional development. Whole foods are non-processed foods, eg. whole grains, brown rice/pasta, organic produce
By being aware of the products and resources we consume, we are having less impact on a planet that evolved over millennia and is being destroyed over lifetimes
Back to topDetached parenting now the norm
“Two hundred years ago, Arthur Schopenhauer wrote that "All truth goes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Then it is violently opposed. Finally, it is accepted as self-evident." This observation has certainly passed the test of time. Copernicus’s writings, in which he claimed that the earth moves around the sun, were banned for decades, and led to an Inquisition trial and house imprisonment for Galileo. Today, of course, the earth’s orbital movement is accepted as 'self-evident'.
Unfortunately, child-rearing practices
and beliefs in the areas of sleeping, feeding, and discipline seem to
be moving in the wrong direction. Our society has moved away from
trust and toward an unnatural, mistrustful, and distant approach to
children. Parents who treat their children with the same love and
trust that was "self-evident" for generations now face
ridicule and opposition. In earlier societies, a child’s need to be
close to his parents during both night and day was a "self-evident
truth", and the obvious way to meet that need was to provide
safety, closeness and comfort. Throughout most of human history,
mothers slept next to their babies, which fostered the bond between
them, and encouraged and facilitated breastfeeding” (Source).
Attachment parenting is NOT permissive or child-centered parenting
"When you're doing it right, your needs are the same as the child's and you don't have to choose between them" by Jean Liedloff author of The Continuum Concept.
People sometimes confuse attachment parenting with permissive or child-centred parenting, however this is not what the child or parent needs. In the west parents often react against their own authoritarian upbringing by being overly centred on their own children. Jean Leadoff writes that many parents, “in their anxiety to be neither negligent nor disrespectful, have gone overboard in … the other direction” (Source). Children need to be in the midst of adult activity but they do not need to be the centre of attention. You can be child centred in so far as you meet your child’s needs but there is also unhealthy child centeredness.
During the in-arms ‘spectator phase’ of childhood, infants and toddlers have a “panoramic view of their future life's experiences” – this feels right to them and so they can be quite observers. However in the West babies are “played with, talked to, or admired all day” which deprives them. “Unable to say what he needs, he will act out his discontentment. He is trying to get his caretaker's attention, yet — and here is the cause of the understandable confusion — his purpose is to get the caretaker to change his unsatisfactory experience, to go about her own business with confidence and without seeming to ask his permission. Once the situation is corrected, the attention-getting behaviour we mistake for a permanent impulse can subside. The same principle applies in the stages following the in-arms phase” (Source).
Who's in Control? The Unhappy Consequences of Being Child-Centered by Jean Liedloff
Liedloff writes about how children need
parents to be in control to feel secure themselves.
Where’s My Center? A closer look at child-centered parenting and the continuum concept by Scott Noelle
Scott Noelle looks at applying The
Continuum Concept principles in a modern western context and
distinguishes between the positive connotation of ‘child-centered’
and from the unhealthy child-centeredness, which Liedloff is
referring to.
Restoring Harmony: A Mother's Story by Abigail Warren
This article is the story of a mother's realisation that she was being too child centred and the problems that this was causing.
Being a self-centred parent by Sarah J Buckley
Living by Principles Instead of by Rules by Sandra Dodd
This article presents ideas and examples by various unschoolers about how living by principles instead of by rules makes life with children easier and more peaceful.
(From Dandra Dodd’s unschooling website unschooling website)
Why is attachment necessary?
Good attachment in early childhood creates emotionally healthy adults.
"Emotion is an essential aspect of interpersonal communication. The capacity to feel is what makes us human, and what connects us to one another. Emotional intelligence is what helps us to achieve our potential, and to fulfil our hearts' ambitions. So, the more we develop and refine our emotional intelligence the more we can enjoy fulfilling relationships, realize our deepest longings, manage life's conflicts with grace, and create fair, peaceful and sustainable societies.
Many of the experiences we have in childhood leave a lasting emotional impression, even if we don't consciously recall them. Childhood therefore has a profound influence on how we relate to each other as adults.
The good news is there is a lot we can do to develop our emotional intelligence as adults. Counselling or psychotherapy can do much to help us develop our emotional health. Conflicts and difficulties can be turned into opportunities for learning, healing and growth.
Nurturing our emotional health can transform our relationships, and in fact, it can change the world.
Since our childhood experiences so strongly influence our emotional health, the way we raise our children is of profound consequence." (Source)
“Although it has of late become
unfashionable to believe parenting skills and parental behavior may
influence the development of emotional and behavioral disorders in
children, current research on attachment shows a shift in parenting
practices is needed to combat further intergenerational transmission
of attachment disorders” (Source).
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Benefits of attachment
“Security of attachment reflects the confidence children have in the responsiveness of their relationships with their caregivers. Children can never be too securely attached to their caregiver (Sroufe, 2000a). Consistently, it is the children with secure attachment relationships who are found to take better advantage of their opportunities in life, are better liked by their peers, have superior leadership and social skills, and are more confident than other children (Levy & Orlans, 1998; Sroufe, 2000a).
Secure children, those who had had their emotional needs met by a responsive adult, were affectively more positive, less aggressive, tantrumy, or angry with others, and more compliant within a classroom setting.
Children and teens with secure attachment histories excel with regards to social and emotional health, leadership skills, morality and prosocial behavior, self-reliance and self-control, and resiliency as appropriate at each stage of development. Also, parenting behaviors are transmitted intergenerationally (Egeland & Erickson, 1999; Levy & Orlans, 1998) and securely attached children grow into parents who are highly responsive and sensitive to their own children” (Source).
What generates good attachment? Attachment Parenting!
“Attachment Parenting… involves a set of parenting skills and behaviors which seek to establish a strong attachment between caregiver and baby starting at birth. This movement of attachment parenting … has the potential to change our culture's view of proper care of infants to a style of care that actively promotes secure attachment.
Attachment parenting is a method of parenting whereby the parents recognize and accept the unique temperament and needs of their child and work to meet the child's physical, spiritual, and emotional needs with sensitivity and consistency. Parents who practice attachment parenting recognize the primary importance of the mother-child bond in the emotional development of infants and toddlers. These parents also recognize the importance of the father-child relationship which, although initially secondary to the mother's role, is nonetheless crucial for healthy child development.
There are five primary attachment parenting practices which build upon this understanding:
- Strongly valuing the signal value of a baby's cry, which mandates quick and sensitive responses to the baby's cries regardless of the hour;
- Birth bonding (the delaying of any separation or routine procedures after birth until after the family has spent time alone to bond) and rooming-in (baby sleeps in the same room as mother after a hospital birth rather than in the nursery);
- Breastfeeding on cue, for comfort as well as nutrition, with child-led weaning;
- Co sleeping, which may take many forms, but commonly results in a family bed;
- 'Babywearing', the wearing of the infant (and toddler) in a soft cloth carrier such as a front pack or a sling, rather than relying on plastic seats, and strollers.
These practices, in isolation or
together, help to provide the best environment for parent-child
attachment” (Source).
The Science of Attachment
Excerpt from: The Science of Attachment: The Biological Roots of Love by Lauren Lindsey Porter
In psychobiological terms, babies are unable to regulate themselves. Despite being born with the capacity for feeling deep emotions, babies are unable to keep themselves in a state of equilibrium. In order to maintain emotional equilibrium, babies require a consistent and committed relationship with one caring person and the person best suited for this relationship is the mother.
What is fascinating about the mother-baby dyad is that, like the biology-environment interplay, it is a synchronized system. The mother tunes to her baby's internal states and responds, which produces a response in the mother, which further fuels the system. One is not independent of the other, and each has a profound effect on the next response. This dyad is the key to healthy development for the baby. The mother must achieve attunement with her baby to create healthy attachment. Thus, healthy attachment is simply the development of that attuned relationship.
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Attachment Parenting Resources
Dr Sears
Dr. William Sears and his wife, Martha Sears, R.N., authors of over a dozen parenting books, popularized the attachment parenting movement. Their website has lots of practical information and displays their full range of books.
Heart to Heart Parenting by Robin Grille (2008)
This outstanding book by Sydney psychologist Robin Grille's second book (2008) aims to help you create a deep and lasting relationship that is unique to you and your child. Using techniques that are based on connection rather than shaming, manipulation and punishment, Grille introduces you to insightful and practical ways to benefit your child's emotional well-being and social development.
This book really is a must read for all parents.
Parenting for a Peaceful World by Robin Grill (2005)
(Support the author by buying the book from his website)
Robin Grille's first book looks at how parenting practices have shaped societies. It also examines the effect of parenting techniques at each stage of a child’s development and shows how these shape adult personality.
The Natural Child Project
The Natural Child Project is a Canadian site which “covers information and advice on all aspects of attachment parenting (raising children with respect and trust), unschooling (trusting the child to set the ‘curriculum’), and child advocacy (including documents from children’s advocacy organizations around the world). In the Table of Contents, articles are listed by author as well as by topic. There is also a search engine for finding specific subjects” (Source).
The site is very up to date with recent articles from highly respected authors and a section called ‘Parenting Site of the Month’, which honors web sites that provide critical information and encouragement to parents.
Scott Noelle
Scott Noelle is an inspiring parenting coach who has come to see the value of attachment parenting through his own experiences. He has two websites, both with a range of excellent information:
You can subscribe to 'Transforming Parenthood', a free e-magazine on a range of attachment parenting issues
You can subscribe to ‘The Daily Groove’, a free daily message for progressive parents. The emails are brief enough to read in a minute or less, providing a quick boost to start or end your day with. It’ll help you leave behind the daily grind, to find and stay 'in your groove' — focused on thoughts that enhance the joy of parenting!
The Continuum Concept
The Continuum Concept, which was first published in 1975, is based on Jean Leadoff’s anthropological observations of the lifestyle of an indigenous tribe, the Yequana, in South America.
While some ideas are a little dated, the basic concept holds true - that human beings evolved expecting to be treated in a certain way by their mothers (eg. breastfed, held constantly during the ‘in arms phase’, have their needs immediately attended to) and that this leads to optimal development of the species. Many of her thoughts have since been proven with neuroscience etc. (see Parenting for a Peaceful World by Robin Grille).
Leadoff’ observed that amongst the Yequana there were no ‘terrible twos’ or children struggling to ‘get their own way,’ or the need for ‘boundaries and discipline. At the same time parents were not permissive. So what did they do? They were attached to their children whilst not being ‘child centred’. That is, children were in the midst of activity but they themselves were not the centre of attention. (For more information on the distinction between Attachment parenting and child-centred parenting see Attachment parenting is NOT permissive or child-centred parenting).
A parenting movement has since evolved out of the book, though it was never intended to be a parenting guide. The Continuum Concept website has a range of great articles and an active international online forum.
‘Where’s My Center? A closer look at child-centered parenting and the continuum concept’ by Scott Noelle looks at applying The Continuum Concept principles in a modern western context and distinguishes between the positive connotation of ‘child-centered’ and from the unhealthy child-centeredness which is what Liedloff is referring to.
‘The Aware Baby’ & ‘Tears and Tantrums’ by Aletha Solter
www.awareparenting.com/books.htm#abnew
Solter discusses the attachment needs of infants, which are best met by close physical contact, breast-feeding, and prompt responsiveness to crying. At the core of her philosophy is the concept of crying as tension release, with the emphasis that babies should always be held when they cry.
'The No Cry Sleep Solution' & 'The No Cry Sleep Solution for toddlers and Preschoolers' by Elizabeth Pantley
'The No Cry Sleep Solution' is an excellent guide on practical alternatives to the harmful practice of controlled comforting/crying, which is often the only option given in many parenting books. It provides tips on gentle ways to adjust your child’s sleeping patterns that are applied over time – there are no quick fixes. It can be used by parents who co-sleep or cot sleep and it has great ideas for those who breastfeed to sleep.
'Unconditional Parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishment to Love and Reason’ by Alfie Kohn
Alfie Kohn is a highly respected author and speaker on human behavior, education, and parenting is highly critical of rewards and competition.
“Unconditional Parenting begins with the question ‘What do children need – and how can we meet those needs?’ rather than ‘How can we get kids to do whatever we tell them?’ It helps parents to move from techniques that emphasize control (and conditional acceptance) to an approach designed to help kids grow into good people” (Source).
‘Five Reasons to Stop Saying "Good Job!"’ by Alfie Kohn (article)
www.alfiekohn.org/articles.htm#null
This article makes the case against praising children and provides alternative ways to support and encourage them. For a more detailed look at this see Alfie’s book Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes. Here he makes the case against using rewards with students, children, and employees; lengthy chapters offer alternatives to traditional carrot-and-stick practices at school, at home, and at work.
‘The Science of Parenting’ by Margot Sutherland (2006)
A practical guidance on sleep, crying, play and building emotional wellbeing for life.
Professor Sunderland, the Director of Education and Training at the Centre for Child Mental Health in London and a British Medical Association award-winning author, has written a new book called The Science of Parenting, which is based on her four-year study of brain scans and scientific research. Here Sunderland entreats parents to reject the modern theories of baby experts … who preach … routine and ‘controlled crying’. 'The blunt truth is that uncomforted distress may cause damage to the child's developing brain,' said Professor Sunderland. She believes that parents often do not give adequate recognition to their children's distress. 'Parents should never try to persuade their child out of feeling a certain emotion,' she said. 'Even if your child is reading a situation in a completely different way to you, it is important to prove to them you are empathising through the time you give them and the language and facial expressions you show (Source).
Australian distributor for The Science of Parenting - Mothers Direct (the Australian Breastfeeding Association’s online store).
Attachment Parenting Bookshelf
For a list of the key attachment parenting books and brief reviews see:
Attachment Parenting Bookshelf at StorkNet.