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Sleep problems don't harm your baby’s mental health and development but can seriously affect parent wellbeing

Dr Pamela Douglas27th of Jun 202311th of Mar 2025

Asian baby in striped blue garment sleeps

It's not true that low sleep need babies, or babies who wake excessively at night, are more likely to have behavioural or learning or mental health problems in later childhood.

  • Babies with low sleep needs develop normally, even though they might always be low sleep need children and adults. Having a low sleep need baby does pose particular challenges for you as a parent, though. You can find out about caring for a low sleep need baby here.

  • Babies who wake excessively at night also go on to develop normally. They will take the sleep they need over a 24-hour period. But these babies' very fragmented sleep pattern is not sustainable for parents. The baby's body clock needs a reset.

As a parent, you will naturally want to make sure your baby gets enough sleep to learn and develop and reach her full potential. If someone you trust tells you that your baby needs a certain amount of sleep to develop normally, and that you should sleep train, you might give that a try, because you want to do the right thing by your baby! Parents often experiment with sleep training because it's still the most widely used approach in health systems in the West. Trying things out is definitely a parenting strength.

But research shows that sleep training

  • Doesn’t decrease the frequency of night-waking in babies. You can find out more here.

  • Often increases parental stress or distress about baby’s sleep. You can find out more here.

  • Doesn't improve developmental or mental health outcomes for children.

This might be surprising to hear. I don't recommend sleep training, because sleep training often makes life much harder than it needs to be for families. You can find out more here and here.

Excessive night waking, however, is not good for you, nor for your whole family. In The Possums Sleep Program, we work with your baby's body clock settings so that your baby returns to normal, more manageable night waking!

Selected references

Bemanalizadeh M, Parsapoor M, Emami L. The association between sleep consolidation and growth and development in early childhood: a systematic review. Health Promotion Perspectives. 2024;14(4):312-318.

Blunden S, Etherton H, Hauck Y. Resistance to cry intensive sleep intervention in young children: are we ignoring children's cries or parental concerns? Children. 2016;3(2):8.

Butler B, Burdayron R, Mazor-Goder G. The association between infant sleep, cognitive, and psychomotor development: a systematic review. Sleep. 2024:doi: 10.1093/sleep/zsae1174.

Douglas PS. Pre-emptive intervention for Autism Spectrum Disorder: theoretical foundations and clinical translation. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience. 2019;13(66):doi.org/10.3389/fnint.2019.00066.

Harries V, Brown A. The association between use of infant parenting books that promote strict routines, and maternal depression, self-efficacy, and parenting confidence. Early Child Development and Care. 2019;189(8):1339-1350.

Makela TE, Peltola MJ, Nieminene P. Night awakening in infancy: developmental stability and longitudinal associations with psychomotor development. Developmental Psychology. 2018;54(7):1208-1218.

Mindell J, Lee C. Sleep, mood, and development in infants. Infant Behaviour and Development. 2015;41:102-107.

Nakagawa A, Naruse M, Heutchy M, Miyachi T. Not sleeping soundly in early infancy is not bad. Acta Paediatrica. 2022;111:2149-2156.

Perrella SL, Dix-Matthews A, Williams J, Rea A, Geddes DT. Breastfeeding and maternal perceptions of infant sleep, settle and cry patterns in the first 9 months. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2022;19(20):13098.

Price AM, Wake M, Ukoumunne OC, Hiscock H. Outcomes at six years of age for children with infant sleep problems: longitudinal community-based study. Sleep Medicine. 2012;13 991-998.

Pennestri M-H, Laganiere C, Bouvette-Turcot A-A, Pokhvisneva I, Steiner M, Jeaney MJ, et al. Uninterrupted infant sleep, development, and maternal mood. Pediatrics. 2018;142(6):e20174330.

Santos IS, Eschevarria P, Tovo-Rodrigues L. Are nocturnal awakenings at age 1 predictive of sleep duration and efficiency at age 6: results from two birth cohorts. Sleep Medicine. 2024:100105.

Wang S-H, Lin K-L, Chen C-L. Sleep problems during early and late infancy: diverse impacts on child developmental trajectories across multiple domains. Sleep Medicine. 2024;115:177-186.

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