What’s life in a baby stroller like?: The impact of stroller orientation on parent-infant interaction and infant stress

A recently published study suggests that babies riding in outward-facing strollers are significantly less likely to laugh, “talk”, and positively interact with their caregivers than those in baby strollers facing the pusher. The study was conducted by Dr Suzanne Zeedyk, Developmental Psychologist at Dundee University’s School of Psychology. Zeedyk asserts that the emotional isolation and poor verbal interaction experienced by babies in outward-facing strollers carries serious, negative implications for babies’ brain development.

Click here for a summary of the study:
http://www.dundee.ac.uk/pressreleases/2008/prnov08/babybuggies.htm

The study, in its entirety, can be found here:
http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/talktoyourbaby/Buggy_research.pdf

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Dr. Henrik Norholt is a member of The World Association of Infant Mental Health. He holds a Ph.D. from the LIFE faculty of Copenhagen University and is a resident of Copenhagen, Denmark. He has been studying the effects of baby carrying as it relates to child psychological and motor development through naturalistic studies since 2001.

He is actively engaged in the study of current and past research into baby carrying through his large international network of family practitioners, midwives, obstetricians, pediatricians and child psychologists and shared his insights with the subscribers to Ergobaby’s blog.

March 25, 2009

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