The Attached Mother

I stumbled upon a great site over the weekend called Parenting Science. It’s a parenting site for those with a more fact-based approach in their choices. The site is created and written by a woman named Gwen Dewar, Ph.D. Gwen is amazing. Just check out her bio to see the great list of credentials she brings to the table. Her training falls within anthropology, evolutionary psychology, and other similar areas. All of which she uses to look at babies and toddlers in terms of where they came from, rather than where modern society wants to stick them.

I am absolutely in love. For me attachment parenting always seemed like common sense because it best fit the basic needs of an infant. When I would hear someone call it a “new fad” I couldn’t help but cringe, most of the basic ideas of attachment parenting have been around longer than we have. All that humans have done is put our own spin on the concept. Gwen writes:

When I think about babies, for instance, I think about how babies and mothers have interacted over millions of years. I think of chimpanzee infants riding their mothers’ backs. I think of the many hours that nonhuman primates spend each day touching and grooming each other. I think of modern hunter-gatherers, and what their lifestyles might reveal about our ancestor’s parenting practices.

I think of the wide range of parenting styles that humans have developed throughout the world, and I know that the parenting practices associated with my culture—the 21st century, English-speaking West—are neither universal nor biologically-determined.

More generally, my scientific training has reinforced my natural skepticism. When I go to the doctor, I need to know what evidence supports the doctor’s advice. And I approach parenting the same way.

There are a small collection of articles already on the site that are worth checking out. The science of attachment parenting is one in particular that looks at attachment parenting practices through a scientific lens. I know that in my own experiences many of the negative responses are generally emotion-based. Often fear and guilt being the two major emotions that stir people to tell me how I am doing damage to my children without any solid evidence to that fact. This is an article to pull out in defense.

Parents who use attachment parenting tools often pull out the “instincts” card. And I am certainly not knocking that, I am a huge supporter of using your instincts while raising your child. If your gut is telling you not to do something that everyone else is doing,I say follow your gut. Unfortunately that is often turned around on us and claims are made that we are not thinking rationally, not looking at the facts. So in those moments when science and my instincts line up it’s worthy of a tiny celebration.

This is certainly one of those times.

parenting, attachment parenting, science