There's so much snark here but I love this. I'd take reading papers like this over mommy blogs every day of the week, even if it's to state the ostensibly obvious.
Does anyone have any other interesting child-rearing resources in this style?
Papers are great, but the fact that this is still a topic of discussion in the 21st century shows that there are no magic bullets, and putting too much stock in a techniques can feel as bad as the problem you are trying to solve if they don't work and you blame yourself.
Among any parenting peer group there will be some whose children fall asleep instantly with no intervention and some who spend hours doing bedtime and get woken up dozens of times a night, despite doing more or less the same thing.
Very much this. I do like that they split the children into "crying-start", "alert-start" and "asleep-start" groups, but ultimately I have had the experience that every kid is different and sleeps differently.
From time to time i go through this cdc[1] website. It is quite comprehensive on child rearing tips.
For a longer form reading i went through [2] and still visit it from time to time. I like it because it discusses multiple approaches and methods and discusses what works and what does not. A bit more scientific, but the gist of it is that most of children's behavior problems are actually parenting problems.
Recently I was trying to figure out why my 1,5 years boy had more liquid poop only when he was in the kindergarten. This made him need to be home quite often. Turned out they were giving him some drink with fruit that made him drink too much water. Given that children do not have perfectly function water absorption in the colon if they drink too much, their stool gets more liquefied. The liquefied poop gets confused for viral diarrhea and he then needs to stay home. I got that insight from [3]. After resumption of diet and removal of sugary fruit from the water, he has been fine for a while now.
Sugary drinks for 1.5 year olds, at kindergarten? Capri-Sun and the like should be banned in schools and daycare, people don’t realize it’s not that different from giving their children Coca-Cola every day.
The books by Emily Oster are great, they’re purely based on data and she’s a PhD in Econ at Brown so she knows to not misinterpret. She’s also a mother and blends in just enough personal experience into these books to make pleasant to read while never straying from the aim of scientific accuracy. On many topics the answer is unfortunately still “some studies show X but there are flaws or they aren’t statistically significant so we don’t know for sure what Is the best answer”
Just a random tip: noise canceling headphones, particularly over-the-ear, are great for keeping calm while holding a screaming baby. They can scream quite loudly, and when you hold them they are often right next to your ear!
Most published research is bogus. Not everything is physics or chemistry. Most things are actually not.
I'd rather advice based on extensive experience and wisdom than "research shows that ...". Basically everytime I see someone says "research shows" I mentally mark it as bullshit.
What is this, red herring, ad hominom, and straw man, all in one sentence?
It's well established that most published research in Psychology and Sociology does not replicate. So there's that. If you don't want to accept that, maybe you are the one who belongs on a facebook page?
Does anyone have any other interesting child-rearing resources in this style?