Early childcare has almost become the norm in many Western countries with a high percentage of infants and toddlers going into daycare/nursery for full days from a very early age – sometimes as young as a few months or even weeks old. While this development seems to be both generally accepted and seen as inevitable, the Tasmanian-based parenting guru Steve Biddulph takes a very different stance. In his book “Raising Babies: Why Your Love is Best” the Australian child psychologist and author explains how this early exposure to center-based daycare may harm our children and why society should reconsider its ideas about early childcare.
High Levels of Stress
According to Biddulph, neurobiological research in different countries clearly suggests that especially during the first two years, small children in center-based childcare suffer from higher levels of stress, resulting in greater aggression and anxiety. The longer the hours in care, the more this affects the development of the brain, making it harder for children to develop into balanced, curious, open-hearted and happy people.
As this happens during a crucial time in the brain’s development where new pathways are constantly being built, the negative effects of early and extensive center-based childcare affects children permanently, setting a pattern of negative experiences of stress, anxiety and negative feelings. Biddulph mentions even more serious consequences found in studies, such as heightened aggression and disobedience, an increased likelihood to suffer from depression, anxiety and substance abuse in the future as well as more-than-average problems with relationships and, finally, a weaker work ethic.
What about the Positive Effects?
These finding are generally accepted and known as the so-called cortisol studies, which measured the presence of stress hormones in young babies and consistently found these levels to be higher in children in long day care. However, some scientists think that children may still benefit from daycare. Usually, cognitive and language skills are mentioned in this context. A closer look at these studies, however, shows that these positive effects are only short to medium term, are not permanent and are the strongest in children from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Besides, the positive effects were only present for children starting center-based childcare during the toddler period (18 to 35 months) – if regular center-based care started during infancy (0-17 months), there was the opposite effect of slowing cognitive development.
In other words: kids from poor families may indeed benefit from early daycare – but not due to any inherent merits but because the situation at home might be so difficult. The so often cited positive effects of daycare on language and cognitive skills only exist for some children and don’t apply at all for the average middle class children from a stable home and with caring parents.
What Children Really Need
At the same time, no center-based daycare – even the very best ones – can provide what children really need at this crucial age: a loving one-to-one care that responds to the child individually. No matter how good the quality of the center concerned, there will always be some negative effects – especially for sensitive kids. And above all – with so many hours away from home, how will little children and parents be able to establish the strong bonding that is so necessary not only for the parent-child relationship but also for the child’s overall development?
These might be unpopular and frustrating facts for many parents who may already feel frustrated and left alone with the difficulties of taking care of small children while struggling financially or feeling worried about their career. Many parents may rightly feel that the last thing they need is feeling guilty about having their child in daycare when they see no other option. In fact, it would be unjust to blame parents who always only want the best for their child and may simply have no alternative but to send their kids daycare. In fact, this could even be the better choice in many cases – for example when parents would otherwise feel strongly depressed or discontent.
On the other hand, nothing’s helped by denying the very real disadvantages of daycare. Whatever one’s decision will be, it is important to be well informed and certainly, no parent should feel guilty about NOT sending their child to daycare. Home-based care by a loving, caring parent or close relative who enjoys taking care of the infant/toddler is always the ideal solution – but it may not always be possible. Another insight that may come from studying the findings of Biddulph and the like are that parents should not be left to struggle alone – after all, it takes a whole village to raise a child, as a Nigerian proverb says. And nowadays, most parents have to do it all by themselves.
Related Reading
- Expert Guidance on Child Care: What's Best by Age. Suite101-article by Martin Bohn.
- 3 New Studies Assess Effects of Child Care. Article by Tamar Lewin in the New York Times.
Sources
- Steve Biddulph. Raising Babies: Why Your Love is Best. Harper Thorsons, 2011.
- Effects of early child-care on cognition, language, and task-related behaviours at 18 months: An English study. A study by Sylva, Stein, Leach and others. Wiley Online Library.
Martin Bohn - As a certified yoga teacher, I enjoy freelancing for various yoga magazines in different countries. In my main profession, I work as a ...
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