Attachment Parenting

A named philosophy from the Sears family

Attachment parenting is the name given to a parenting philosophy popularized by the Sears family, whose website describes it under the heading Attachment Parenting and refers to the 'seven baby Bs' presented by Martha Sears in a video. The page reviewed does not list the seven Bs in text, and it does not state a publication date for any book. The 1992 publication of The Baby Book and the contents of the seven Bs are therefore not confirmed here and are flagged for editorial verification.

Attachment Parenting International

Attachment Parenting International, an organization that promotes the approach, publishes eight principles of parenting. As titled on its site, they are: prepare for pregnancy, birth and parenting; feed with love and respect; respond with sensitivity; use a nurturing touch; ensure safe sleep, physically and emotionally; provide consistent and loving care; practice positive discipline; and strive for balance in personal and family life. These are the organization's own statements of the approach and are attributed to it.

What the sources reviewed do not cover

The sources reviewed do not establish when the term first appeared, who coined it in print, or how the approach spread internationally. Scholarly histories of the movement were not located in free-access form, so this page makes no claims about its cultural history beyond the organizational statements above.

Attachment parenting and attachment theory

Attachment theory is a framework in developmental psychology. A UK national evidence review defines attachment as an infant's innate tendency to seek comfort from a caregiver and notes that research links attachment to social and emotional development. Attachment parenting is a different thing: a named set of parenting values and practices with its own organizations. Research on attachment security in infants is therefore not a test of the attachment parenting brand, and the same review describes wide variation in how professionals define attachment.

Attachment parenting and attachment therapy

Attachment therapy is a separate and controversial clinical practice with its own Machipedia page, Attachment Therapy. A 2006 published comment in the journal Child Maltreatment, written in response to a professional task force report, distinguishes controversial parenting and therapeutic practices from developmentally appropriate attachment parenting. Only the title and indexing of that comment could be read, so its arguments are not summarized here.

Related Machipedia pages

Attachment parenting belongs to the Machipedia family page Parenting Approaches, which compares named approaches side by side. Pages on individual practices associated with it include Babywearing and Breastfeeding, while Infant Sleep Coaching, Gentle Parenting and Positive Parenting cover approaches that overlap with or differ from it. This page does not repeat those entries.

What proponents describe in general terms

Attachment Parenting International describes its eight principles as covering preparation for parenthood, feeding, sensitive responding to a child, nurturing touch, sleep, consistent care, positive discipline and balance in family life. The organization presents these as ideas for parents to consider rather than a single fixed routine. This page gives no instructions for carrying out any of them.

Community programs

A qualitative case study in Ontario, Canada, examined an eight-week community attachment parenting program run by an attachment and trauma-informed organization. Data came from a focus group and reflective journals kept by participating mothers, and five themes emerged, including infant and mother attachment, program delivery, facilitator competencies and connections with others. The study reports mothers' views of the program rather than measured outcomes.

What adherents say the approach is for

Attachment Parenting International frames its principles around sensitive, consistent and affectionate caregiving, and around the parent's own balance. In the organization's terms the approach is meant to support the relationship between parent and child. The page reviewed does not state specific health outcomes, and none are asserted here.

Beliefs about individual practices

Parents who identify with the approach commonly link individual practices, such as carrying an infant or breastfeeding, to closeness with a child. These are beliefs attributed to adherents and are not findings. A study of mothers who breastfed two children at once found that these mothers described more attachment parenting, which shows how the practices are grouped by adherents but does not show an effect. Whether such practices produce particular outcomes is addressed in the evidence section, where the findings are limited and drawn from small samples.

The philosophy as a whole

Searches of PubMed and Europe PMC for the phrase attachment parenting returned a small set of papers, most of which concern attachment theory or parenting in general rather than the branded approach. No randomized trial of attachment parenting as a complete philosophy was identified. Studies of maternal wellbeing and attachment parenting that are commonly cited, including work by Liss and colleagues, could not be opened and verified in free-access form, so their findings are not reported.

Babywearing as a separate practice

A randomized trial of infant carrying assigned adolescent mothers either to carry their infants for one hour daily for three months (16 mothers) or to a reading comparison (17 mothers). At seven months the carried infants were more likely to be classified as securely attached and less likely to be classified as disorganized. There were no significant differences for avoidant or resistant types. The sample was small and drawn from a higher-risk group, and the trial tests one practice rather than the philosophy.

Attachment interventions and breastfeeding studies

A UK systematic review pooled seven trials of structured parenting interventions and found a lower odds of disorganized attachment and higher odds of secure attachment. Those interventions are formal programs, not attachment parenting, and the review found that many routinely used attachment interventions have a weak evidence base.

An online questionnaire study of tandem breastfeeding found that tandem-nursing mothers reported more attachment parenting and less authoritarian parenting, and also reported increased anger and aggression toward the older child. The design is cross-sectional and self-reported, so it cannot show that either practice caused any outcome.

Infant sleep guidance on bed-sharing

The American Academy of Pediatrics 2022 policy statement states that roughly 3500 infants die of sleep-related causes each year in the United States and recommends a firm, flat sleep surface and room sharing without bed sharing. It adds information to help parents and clinicians assess the risk of specific bed-sharing situations. Attachment Parenting International lists safe sleep among its principles, and readers should consult current pediatric guidance on infant sleep.

What the evidence on bed-sharing shows

A Cochrane review of bed sharing for healthy term newborns found no eligible randomized trials, so it could not report effects. It notes that possible physiological benefits have been proposed, that the main harm of concern is a possible increase in sudden infant death syndrome, and that earlier studies gave conflicting results. A 2013 case report in a pediatrics journal describes cardiopulmonary arrest in a preterm newborn during attachment parenting in bed; only the title and indexing were available for review.

Professional guidance and care boundaries

UNICEF UK's Baby Friendly Initiative publishes a guide on co-sleeping and SIDS for health professionals, described as encouraging a sensible, proportionate and parent-centred approach. The figures are in a downloadable document that was not read for this page. No statutory regulation or training standard for attachment parenting was found. Parents with concerns about an infant's sleep, feeding or health should speak with a qualified clinician and should not delay necessary care.

Criticism and burden on parents

Critics have argued that demanding parenting ideals can place a heavy burden on mothers, and a 2012 magazine cover is often cited as a cultural reference point. No free-access source confirming these points was opened for this page, so the criticisms are noted only as areas for editorial follow-up and are not evaluated here.