5 ms·

Cutting edge research indeed. We need to spread the news, tell all the parents that carrying kids helps sooth them. There is no way that parents could have come

by xyzzyz 4y ago

Cutting edge research indeed. We need to spread the news, tell all the parents that carrying kids helps sooth them. There is no way that parents could have come up and tried this on their own.

tjcvirage 4y ago
I independently found my way to a similar approach. However, having resources available to new parents is immensely valuable when you're at your wits end. Actually, you could say the same about all manners of recording history; Story telling, art, education, music. Why bother with any of it if people can figure it out for themselves? Because we progress further when we work as a team and share knowledge.
jjcon 4y ago
I also find it hilarious when studies point out the blatantly obvious - but I'd rather see this way more often than tons of unreplicable crap churned out.
brink 4y ago
To be fair, some of us (me included) are about to be parents for the first time. I'll take all the good pointers I can get, obvious or not.
- xyzzyz 4y ago
  Don’t worry, this one will come up naturally. In general, I recommend taking all advice with a grain of salt: not because it is bad advice, but because no kids are the same, and what works with one will not necessarily work with another. Just take it easy and try to not worry too much. The unbroken chain of your ancestors have all figured it out, and so can you. And congratulations!
  - notinfuriated 4y ago
    And, what works on one kid one day, may not work the next!
- hattmall 4y ago
  Yeah as someone else said, you will figure this out. There's only so many things you can do with a crying baby. It's completely natural that you will walk and hold them and figure out a rhythm. I've figured out with my second that lighting levels are important. Timing the darkness works well, and I figured it out by walking around with her but the lighting is really variable in my house and going too light or too dark will startle her. Probably could do a study on hoe gradual shifting of lights effects baby.
wgjordan 4y ago
Be kind. Don't be snarky. Please don't post shallow dismissals. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
gnicholas 4y ago
That wasn't the point. The point was that you don't go from walking the baby to sleep to putting the baby down horizontally. You sit down for 5-8 minutes first, during which time the baby transitions into a deeper sleep that won't be disturbed by being laid down. If you go from walking to putting the baby down horizontally, the baby will often be awakened by the sensation of falling backwards, and wake up.
- xyzzyz 4y ago
  That's hardly a nontrivial thing to try, and indeed, I came up with this genius idea independently. Should have published it! Do you have children of your own?
  - gnicholas 4y ago
    I do. No one is saying "no parent has ever tried this genius idea". They're just saying that it's useful to have a study on it, and parameters around how long one should remain sitting before attempting to lay the baby down. Also, you're moving the goalposts. Your original comment said derided the idea about walking a baby to sleep. But that shows you missed the point of the study, which was not about walking at all, but rather the next step. That step is apparently not super obvious because this grabbed over 300 upvotes on HN, no small feat. Even if it was obvious to some, parents of newborns are often (always?) sleep-deprived, so it might be hard for them to remember how well it worked to hold the baby still for 2, 4, or 6 minutes. I didn't have especially difficult sleepers, but it would have been nice to have seen this data back when we had tiny ones.

by xyzzyz 4y ago

Cutting edge research indeed. We need to spread the news, tell all the parents that carrying kids helps sooth them. There is no way that parents could have come up and tried this on their own.

tjcvirage 4y ago

I independently found my way to a similar approach. However, having resources available to new parents is immensely valuable when you're at your wits end. Actually, you could say the same about all manners of recording history; Story telling, art, education, music. Why bother with any of it if people can figure it out for themselves? Because we progress further when we work as a team and share knowledge.

jjcon 4y ago

I also find it hilarious when studies point out the blatantly obvious - but I'd rather see this way more often than tons of unreplicable crap churned out.

brink 4y ago

To be fair, some of us (me included) are about to be parents for the first time. I'll take all the good pointers I can get, obvious or not.

xyzzyz 4y ago
Don’t worry, this one will come up naturally. In general, I recommend taking all advice with a grain of salt: not because it is bad advice, but because no kids are the same, and what works with one will not necessarily work with another. Just take it easy and try to not worry too much. The unbroken chain of your ancestors have all figured it out, and so can you. And congratulations!
- notinfuriated 4y ago
  And, what works on one kid one day, may not work the next!
hattmall 4y ago
Yeah as someone else said, you will figure this out. There's only so many things you can do with a crying baby. It's completely natural that you will walk and hold them and figure out a rhythm. I've figured out with my second that lighting levels are important. Timing the darkness works well, and I figured it out by walking around with her but the lighting is really variable in my house and going too light or too dark will startle her. Probably could do a study on hoe gradual shifting of lights effects baby.

wgjordan 4y ago

Be kind. Don't be snarky. Please don't post shallow dismissals. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

gnicholas 4y ago

That wasn't the point. The point was that you don't go from walking the baby to sleep to putting the baby down horizontally. You sit down for 5-8 minutes first, during which time the baby transitions into a deeper sleep that won't be disturbed by being laid down. If you go from walking to putting the baby down horizontally, the baby will often be awakened by the sensation of falling backwards, and wake up.

xyzzyz 4y ago
That's hardly a nontrivial thing to try, and indeed, I came up with this genius idea independently. Should have published it! Do you have children of your own?
- gnicholas 4y ago
  I do. No one is saying "no parent has ever tried this genius idea". They're just saying that it's useful to have a study on it, and parameters around how long one should remain sitting before attempting to lay the baby down. Also, you're moving the goalposts. Your original comment said derided the idea about walking a baby to sleep. But that shows you missed the point of the study, which was not about walking at all, but rather the next step. That step is apparently not super obvious because this grabbed over 300 upvotes on HN, no small feat. Even if it was obvious to some, parents of newborns are often (always?) sleep-deprived, so it might be hard for them to remember how well it worked to hold the baby still for 2, 4, or 6 minutes. I didn't have especially difficult sleepers, but it would have been nice to have seen this data back when we had tiny ones.