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What Are the Long-Term Effects of Sleep Training?

April 14, 2025 | Leave a Comment

baby crying
Image Source: Unsplash

Sleep training is a sensitive, complex topic. Some parents and experts swear by it and extol the benefits of allowing babies to self-soothe. Others believe that letting babies “cry it out” could create attachment issues and increase infant stress. To help you decide how to handle bedtime, let’s dive into some of the studies that show the long-term effects of sleep training.

What Is Sleep Training?

Before we dive into the studies, it’s important to understand what sleep training is. Sleep training is an umbrella term that encompasses many different types of bedtime routines. These run the gamut from shutting the door and letting babies “cry it out” to sleeping next to their crib. This method is often referred to as “camping out” in the baby’s nursery. Some sleep training methods recommend checking on your child at regular intervals or if they cry for too long.

The fact that there are so many sleep training methods can make it difficult for researchers to compare all of them. It’s possible that the type of sleep training you use may affect your baby’s long-term outcomes.

Effects of Sleep Training

Health of the Parents

One of the most positive long-term effects of sleep training is the health benefits this method confers on parents. Obviously, your baby waking up and crying frequently disturbs your sleep, which has negative consequences over time. Studies have shown that depressed moms are more likely to have babies with broken sleep patterns. In this case, sleep training may be beneficial. According to the BBC, mothers of sleep-trained two-year-olds were less likely to be depressed. Ultimately, when parents have better mental health, they’re able to be more responsive, engaged, and effective.

Long-Term Attachment

baby looking at you
Image Source: Unsplash

Some experts warn that sleep training could create attachment issues and increase infant stress. However, these claims can be hard to verify because it’s difficult to gauge anxiety in infants. One method used is measuring cortisol, which can be tricky because it naturally fluctuates throughout the day. So experts say to take study results with a grain of salt.

With that being said, a small study found that babies had elevated cortisol levels after sleep training interventions. Plus, in 1998, Harvard researchers discovered that babies who were left to cry could be more susceptible to stress and trauma as adults. However, some longitudinal studies yielded different findings.

Researchers in Australia decided to measure children’s cortisol levels five years later to gauge the long-term effects of sleep training. One group had undergone behavioral intervention as babies, while the other group hadn’t. Since the two groups had no significant difference in cortisol levels, they concluded that sleep training doesn’t make kids more stressed in the long run.

According to the BBC, another long-term study found that sleep-trained babies were no more likely to have attachment or behavioral issues at six years of age than other children. Their sleep patterns and cortisol levels were also in line with expectations.

Short-Term Sleep Improvement

Another benefit of sleep training is short-term sleep improvement. A review of 52 studies found that 80% of children experienced clinically significant improvements from bedtime behavioral interventions. These improvements were maintained for between 3 and 6 months. Parents may need to repeat sleep training to make the results stick long-term. However, these results suggest that it’s an effective way to get your baby to fall and stay asleep, potentially helping the whole family get more rest.

Sleep is a tricky topic because every baby and family is different. What works for you may not work for your friends and vice versa. Ultimately, you have to follow your parental instincts. Experts say that going against them can make you more stressed out, so don’t feel like you have to sleep train just because it’s popular. Whether you prefer to rock your baby to sleep or let them self-soothe, feel free to follow your parental intuition.

Read More

  • My Experience With Co-Sleeping
  • Sleeping, Outings and Other Tips to Remember During Potty Training
Vicky Monroe headshot
Vicky Monroe

Vicky Monroe is a freelance personal finance writer who enjoys learning about and discussing the psychology of money. In her free time, she loves to cook and tackle DIY projects.

Filed Under: Baby Stuff Tagged With: child development, Sleep, sleep training

How to Help Your Teen Create Healthy Sleep Habits

June 17, 2020 | Leave a Comment

sleep hygiene for teens

Despite needing over 9 hours of sleep a night, your teen is likely getting closer to only 7 hours, and that’s a huge problem.

Sleep deprivation in teens affects their mental health and their ability to focus on their studies. It can make them more prone to depression and anxiety.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Money and Finances Tagged With: Sleep

Our Family Bed – A Solution for Sleep

February 26, 2013 | 2 Comments

family bedThis is a post I never thought I would write. A family bed was a totally foreign concept to me before having a baby. I didn’t know that people choose to sleep with their child – that it was a thing. If you had asked me before having a child if they would sleep with us, I would think you were crazy and quickly answer, no. My husband and I didn’t intentionally set out to establish a family bed with our daughter, it just sort of happened.  I learned firsthand the importance of sleep and structure.

 

How Our Family Bed Started…

It started while I was in the hospital recovering from my cesarean section. Our new baby was in the bassinet beside my hospital bed, my husband asleep in his bed near my feet. Baby girl would wake and I would need to nurse her. Shifting, even a little after my surgery was difficult, only complicated more by tubes and wires. I didn’t want to wake my husband knowing I needed him on his A-game during the daytime. I had access to nurses but at 2am I decided their skills were better for new moms who needed them beyond passing a baby. I reached for her one last time and brought her into my bed, propped with pillows and tight in my arms, we both fell asleep almost instantly.

We came home and quickly realized I would not be able to sleep in our bed for a least a few days. Our bed is quite high off the ground and even with the help of a stool I couldn’t easily pull myself in bed. I decided to sleep on our couch until I regained more strength and have the baby in her bassinet beside me.

After about ten days, I was finally able to get into my bed and moved the bassinet in our room where we all slept. I knew I wanted our baby close for the first few months but didn’t realize how close I wanted her.

Our baby girl was very predictable, waking every three hours on the dot. She would wake in the night and I would lift her out of her bassinet, carry her to the chair where I would nurse her and rock her back to sleep praying that she didn’t wake as soon as she was out of my arms and back in her bassinet.

From the time we both woke until the time I crawled back into bed was at least  45 minutes. I didn’t mind initially, fulling expecting and accepting lost sleep with a baby. Problem being that baby girl was starting to wake almost every 2 hours with little sleep between wake times. We were both exhausted.

After a few weeks of rocking and praying for her to sleep, one especially exhausting night I couldn’t find the strength in me to wake up and move for our normal routine. I picked her up out of her bassinet, laid her down beside me to nurse where she ate and we both quickly fell back asleep. I could sleep on my side curled around her, it was great. In terms of comfort, the side is usually the best sleeping position, but can vary depending on the person. We all, husband included, slept great that night.

 

Getting Back Sleep With The Family Bed

This was the beginning. I would try her in the bassinet but usually ended up moving her in with us so we could all sleep. Baby girl and I would both continue to slightly wake when she would eat but never fully and never for long. It wasn’t long that we all grew to love our sleeping arrangement and I would put her down for the night in our bed, hours before my husband and I were ready for bed.

Today she is eight months old and this is still how we sleep the majority of the time. She now goes to bed in her crib but when she wakes during the night I don’t fight her. If I can’t get her back to sleep in a reasonable time, she comes to bed with us. I’ve accepted that there is no perfect solution for every family and for us, this works. She’s growing so fast I know I’ll appreciate the closeness that we’re sharing, as a family,  in her early days. I love waking to her slobbery kisses and blabbering.

Do you have a family bed at home?  Did you try it when nursing?

Read More:

Choosing a Bed: Sleep Number vs Tempurpedic

Catherine
Catherine

Catherine is a first time momma to a rambunctious toddler. When she isn’t soaking up all that motherhood has to offer, you can find her blogging over at Plunged in Debt where she chronicles her and her husbands journey out of debt. You can also follow her on Twitter.

plungedindebt.com

Filed Under: Parenting Tagged With: Bed, Co-sleeping, family bed, Sleep, The Family Bed

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Basic Principles Of Good Parenting

Here some basic principles for good parenting:

  1. What You Do Matters: Your kids are watching you. So, be purposeful about what you want to accomplish.
  2. You Can’t be Too Loving: Don’t replace love with material possessions, lowered expectations or leniency.
  3. Be Involved Your Kids Life: Arrange your priorities to focus on what your kid’s needs. Be there mentally and physically.
  4. Adapt Your Parenting: Children grow quickly, so keep pace with your child’s development.
  5. Establish and Set Rules: The rules you set for children will establish the rules they set for themselves later.  Avoid harsh discipline and be consistent.
  6. Explain Your Decisions: What is obvious to you may not be evident to your child. They don’t have the experience you do.
  7. Be Respectful To Your Child: How you treat your child is how they will treat others.  Be polite, respectful and make an effort to pay attention.
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