The legacy of Victorian child-rearing practices

Many common modern childrearing practices have their roots in the advice of Victorian paediatricians & psychologists such as Sir Truby King, Emmett Holt, Granville Stanley Hall & John B Watson. They advocated forcing babies into routines with no flexibility & no acknowledgement of their differing needs, nor of the importance of comfort & closeness. For decades, it was common for babies to be left to cry for hours at the bottom of the garden, while their mothers cried too, desperate to pick them up & feed them, but terrified of spoiling their child if they did. ⁣

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"Truby King babies are fed 4-hourly from birth, with few exceptions, and they do not have any night feeds... A Truby King baby has as much fresh air & sunshine as possible & his right amount of sleep. The infant who is fed regularly, put to sleep & played with at definite times soon finds that appeals bring no response & so learns that most useful of lessons, self-control, and the recognition of an authority other than his own wishes.’ (King, F. Truby 1918)’⁣

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Holt also promoted the idea of regimented & disciplined parenting. His book included a schedule of activities (such as toilet training) to be learned at specific ages, and meals at regular hours to "prevent disease". He advised that: "Babies under six months should never be played with: and the less of it at anytime the better for the infant. They are made nervous & irritable, sleep badly & suffer from indigestion.”⁣

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John B. Watson wrote a child advice book called Psychological Care of Infant and Child, that sold into the second half of the 1900s.  In a chapter titled “Too Much Mother Love,” he wrote: ‘Never hug & kiss them, never let them sit in your lap. If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say goodnight. Shake hands with them in the morning. When you are tempted to pet your child remember that mother love is a dangerous instrument. An instrument which may inflict a never-healing wound, a wound which may make infancy unhappy, adolescence a nightmare, an instrument which may wreck your adult son or daughter’s vocational future & their chances for marital happiness.’⁣

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Photo of my grandfather Sebastian Earl.