Bringing Up Baby (TV series)

Last updated

Bringing Up Baby
Country of originUnited Kingdom
Original languageEnglish
No. of seasons1
No. of episodes4
Production
Executive producer Daisy Goodwin
Production companySilver River
Release
Original network Channel 4
Original release25 September (2007-09-25) 
16 October 2007 (2007-10-16)

Bringing Up Baby is a four-part British television documentary series which compares three different childcare methods for babies: the Truby King method (a strict, routine-based method popular in the 1950s), the Benjamin Spock approach (a more relaxed approach based on parents' instincts, popular in the 1960s), and the Continuum concept (in which babies are in constant contact with a parent at all times, based on tribal child-rearing methods and popular in the 1970s). Each method was advocated and administered by a nanny for two families each. The series was controversial when it aired on Channel 4 in 2007, particularly due to the actions recommended by Truby King advocate Claire Verity, [1] and questions over Verity's qualifications. [2]

Contents

The Methods

The Truby King method

Mentor Claire Verity espoused a routine popular in the 1950s, based on the 1907 book Feeding And Care Of Babies by Truby King: that babies should follow a strict routine from the day they are born, and that parents should dictate this routine, not the other way round. This included a rigid timetable with feeds every four hours, a separate room from the parents from day one, and rules forbidding "unnecessary contact" especially when the babies woke during the night. Verity also recommended that the babies spend several hours per day outside, saying that the fresh air helped them to sleep better.[ citation needed ]

The Benjamin Spock approach

Mentor Dreena Hamilton supervised two families (including a single mother) with the approach outlined by Benjamin Spock in his best-selling book The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care . The Spock method encouraged parents to use their instincts to detect a child's needs. Sarah Fox, one of the mothers using Spock's method admitted that her son Leon did not sleep as well as she would have liked, but the closer bond between them made following Spock worthwhile.[ citation needed ]

The Continuum concept

Mentor Claire Scott had her two families follow the Continuum concept, developed from a study of South American Indians by anthropologist Jean Liedloff. The Continuum concept recommends constant skin-to-skin contact between the baby and its parents until it is twelve months old. The child sleeps in the same bed as the parents, and is carried around in a sling during the day. Grace Collins, who raised her son Oliver using the concept, also praised the bond this method built up between the child and parents, was not too inconvenient and had a positive effect on Oliver's development.[ citation needed ]

Controversy

The UK's media regulator Ofcom received 752 complaints about Bringing Up Baby, and conducted an investigation which cleared the programme of breaching the broadcasting code. [3] Ofcom found that although some of the techniques portrayed in the series were controversial, they were presented in an appropriate context, and the audience was properly informed of the benefits and disadvantages of each. It determined that Channel 4 had taken due care to ensure the health and wellbeing of the children used as subjects in the experiment, and that the families involved had given clear consent and were free to discontinue their involvement at any time during the filming. [4] [5]

Childcare expert Gina Ford strongly criticised Verity's methods in a letter to the NSPCC, urging them to take steps to ensure that television production companies not continue what she called a form of "child abuse". [6]

The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths (FSID) released a statement on its website, expressing concern over Verity's recommendation that a baby sleep in a separate room from its parents from the day it was born. The FSID stated that "Advice on the programme that a baby should sleep in its own bedroom from day one has, in fact, been found to double the risk of cot death." [7]

In addition, questions arose over Verity's qualifications as a maternity nurse. Channel 4 had issued a press release listing a number of qualifications Verity claimed to hold. When The Times newspaper requested a list from Verity's agent, it found the lists differed. Verity claimed to hold diplomas in child daycare and pre-school practice from ASET, qualifications in maternity practice, sleep training and paediatrics from Maternity Nurse Training, and a diploma in childcare from Goal. All three organisations confirmed that they had no record of granting such qualifications to Verity, and Channel 4 conducted an investigation into the claims. [8]

When the series aired in Australia on the ABC1 network in 2009, complaints to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation regarding the controversies in the UK prompted the ABC to broadcast a disclaimer before the second and subsequent episodes of the series:

Disclaimer: Some of the parenting practices advocated by the mentors in this series are not consistent with current, scientifically based, safe sleeping messages and can increase the risks of sudden and unexpected death in infancy including SIDS and fatal sleeping accidents. The ABC advises that the term "maternity nurse" used in this program does not signify a professionally qualified nurse but rather someone with experience in caring for babies and children. [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Benjamin Spock</span> American pediatrician, political activist, and writer (1903–1998)

Benjamin McLane Spock was an American pediatrician and left-wing political activist whose book Baby and Child Care (1946) is one of the best-selling books of the twentieth century, selling 500,000 copies in the six months after its initial publication in 1946 and 50 million by the time of Spock's death in 1998. The book's premise to mothers was that they "know more than you think you do." Spock's parenting advice and recommendations revolutionized parental upbringing in the United States, and he is considered to be amongst the most famous and influential Americans of the 20th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nanny</span> Person employed to take care of other peoples children

A nanny is a person who provides child care. Typically, this care is given within the children's family setting. Throughout history, nannies were usually servants in large households and reported directly to the lady of the house. Today, modern nannies, like other domestic workers, may live in or out of the house, depending on their circumstances and those of their employers. Some employment agencies specialize in providing nannies, as there are families that specifically seek them and may make them a part of the household.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nursemaid</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Child care</span> Care and supervision of children

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Attachment parenting (AP) is a parenting philosophy that proposes methods aiming to promote the attachment of parent and infant not only by maximal parental empathy and responsiveness but also by continuous bodily closeness and touch. The term attachment parenting was coined by the American pediatrician William Sears. There is no conclusive body of research that shows Sears' approach to be superior to "mainstream parenting".

William Penton Sears, also referred to as Dr. Bill, is an American pediatrician and the author or co-author of parenting books. Sears is a celebrity doctor, and has been a guest on various television talk shows. Sears is a proponent of the attachment parenting philosophy, and is most well known for authoring The Baby Book, which popularized that style of parenting.

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The continuum concept is an idea, coined by Jean Liedloff in her 1975 book The Continuum Concept, that human beings have an innate set of expectations that our evolution as a species has designed us to meet in order to achieve optimal physical, mental, and emotional development and adaptability. According to Liedloff, in order to achieve this level of development, young humans require the kind of experience to which our species adapted during the long process of our evolution by natural selection.

<i>The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care</i> 1946 book by Benjamin Spock

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Truby King</span> New Zealand health reformer

Sir Frederic Truby King, generally known as Truby King, was a New Zealand health reformer and Director of Child Welfare. He is best known as the founder of the Plunket Society.

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Norland College is a British higher education provider based in Bath, Somerset. The college specialises in childcare, and is widely known for its prestigious training of nannies, nursery nurses and other childcare professionals, who are employed worldwide.

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Claire Verity is a British baby care professional who specialises in the Truby King method. Her clients have included Jerry Hall and Sting. She featured as a mentor in the 2007 Channel 4 documentary series, Bringing Up Baby.

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Supernanny is a British reality television programme about parents struggling with their children's behaviour, mealtime, potty training, etc. The show features professional nanny Jo Frost, who devotes each episode to helping a family where the parents are struggling with child-rearing. Through instruction and observation, she shows parents alternative ways to discipline their children and regain order in their households. Frost is a proponent of the "naughty chair" theory of discipline and is strictly opposed to hitting and spanking.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years</span>

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The Mothercraft Training Society was an organization in the United Kingdom which trained expectant and new mothers, nurses, midwives, and health visitors in 'mothercraft', with the aim of bringing down infant mortality. Briefly known as the Babies of the Empire Society, before taking on its new name, it established its own infant welfare clinic, with a dietetic hospital, and ran a year-long training course from which students emerged as qualified nursery nurses.

References

  1. Adams, Stephen & Sarah Womack: Bringing Up Baby is 'dangerous' say experts, The Daily Telegraph , 17 October 2007.
  2. Shaikh, Thair: Inquiry into Bringing up Baby nanny, The Guardian , 27 October 2007.
  3. Not in Breach: Bringing Up Baby Archived 16 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine , Ofcom Broadcast Bulletin Issue number 98, 3 December 2007.
  4. Sweney, Mark: Ofcom clears Bringing Up Baby, The Guardian , 3 December 2007.
  5. Baby TV show did not breach rules, BBC News , 4 December 2007.
  6. Cleland, Gary: TV nanny Claire Verity criticised by rival, 8 October 2007.
  7. Channel 4 baby mentor advice puts babies' lives at risk Archived 29 August 2008 at the Wayback Machine , Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths, 26 September 2007.
  8. Foster, Patrick: TV’s toughest nanny and the string of qualifications that do not exist, The Times , 27 October 2007.
  9. How Not To Bring Up Baby, Media Watch , Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2 March 2009.