Voice Your Opposition To Controlled Crying Study

We the undersigned strongly object to the conditions of the study on Infant Sleep Disturbance, which is being conducted by Kate Jackson at Flinders University.

We are concerned that the children involved in the study will be subjected to ‘sleep training’, otherwise known as controlled crying, cry it out or controlled comforting. This aspect of the study is inconsistent with Flinders University Ethics policy [1], which requires researchers to protect the rights of their experimental subjects.

The Australian Association for Infant Mental Health [2] does not support the practice of controlled crying stating that the technique “is not consistent with what infants need for their optimal emotional and psychological health, and may have unintended negative consequences”. If there is ANY concern that controlled crying could be harmful to infants, then the rights of the child are not being protected and the study should cease immediately.

We are also concerned with comments that Kate Jackson has made to the media which display bias unfit for someone conducting a scientific study, “Conflicting advice about controlled crying meant some parents were being scared off the technique” [3] .

As informed individuals we question the theoretical foundations of this study, in particular, the definition of 'sleep problems' [4]. There is evidence to support that it is completely natural for infants to wake often during the night throughout their first year and beyond [5,6]. This is NOT a 'sleep problem'.

Controlled crying and other similar regimes may indeed work (although one Australian baby magazine survey found that only 8% of mothers who used controlled crying said that it worked for more than a week [7]) to produce a self-soothing, solitary sleeping infant. However, the trade-off could be an anxious, clingy or hyper-vigilant child or even worse, a child whose trust is broken. Unfortunately, we can't measure attributes such as trust and empathy which are the basic skills for forming all relationships[7].

We suggest that a study into the true causes of parent fatigue would benefit families much more than this proposed study.

References:

1. Flinders University, Ethics and Biosafety.
http://www.flinders.edu.au/research/info-for-researchers/ethics/

2. The Australian Association for Infant Mental Health,
http://www.aaimhi.org/documents/position%20papers/controlled_crying.pdf

3. The Sunday Mail, Adelaide Now.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,24305993-5006301,00.html

4. http://www.ssn.flinders.edu.au/psyc/students/KateJackson/
http://www.ssn.flinders.edu.au/psyc/students/KateJackson/ISDwebflyer.pdf

5. Pub Med, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8680184?dopt=Abstract

6. Goodlin J, Beth L, Burnham M M, Gaylor E E, Anders T F, 2001, Night Waking, Sleep-Wake Organization, and Self-Soothing in the First Year of Life, Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, Volume 22, Issue 4, pp. 211-277. View abstract at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11530895?dopt=Abstract

7. http://www.pinky-mychild.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=22:the-con-of-controlled-crying&catid=11:sleep&Itemid=36