There’s no question about it: Having a baby is stressful. Sleepless nights, incessant crying and feelings of burnout can take the calmest of people to the brink. However, for some, stress and exhaustion equates shouting. While occasionally losing your patience — and tone of voice — around an infant is hardly cause for alarm (you’re human, after all!), frequent yelling at baby is different.
“Babies have sensitive startle responses, so in the moment, yelling around a baby will likely lead to a response such as tensing, widening eyes or crying,” explains Ariel Horvitz, a clinical psychologist with The Family Institute at Northwestern. “Continued shouting out of anger around a baby, even when not directed to a baby, will likely increase their stress levels and anxiety, which may make attaching to the primary caregiver harder.
Here’s what experts want you to know about yelling at a baby — and what to do about it.
How does shouting affect a baby?
By design, human beings are social creatures. “The structures of the brain’s anatomy and even the features of our body have strong developmental purposes to inspire connection — hence, a baby’s coos and smiles,” explains Tyler Keith, a licensed clinical social worker who specializes in treating children, who have experienced significant stress and trauma at Thriveworks in Wilmington, NC. “On the flip side, when adults are in the same space as a baby, they undergo chemical changes that put out what social scientists call ‘social cues.’ Because of this, babies and their caregivers are very much connected both verbally and nonverbally.”
As a nonverbal example, Keith explains that a baby may cry when they’re in the arms of someone who’s angry, upset or nervous “out of a desire to have the adult demonstrate care, guidance and security.” When an adult shouts in front of a baby, the effects can be more long lasting.
“… Babies and their caregivers are very much connected both verbally and nonverbally.”
— TYLER KEITH, LICENSED CLINICAL SOCIAL WORKER
Potential psychological effects of yelling at a baby
Here are a few ways shouting can affect a baby:
It can hamper social learning. “When an adult shouts around a baby, it affects how the baby learns about the ‘serve and return’ of a conversation: I wait, you talk. You end and now wait while I talk,” he explains. “When shouting occurs, it’s a scrambled mess of sensory input that can overwhelm the child.”
It can make a space feel unsafe. “Yelling can result in a baby’s ‘bids’ for attention to feel unheard, unnoticed and make a space feel unsafe to the child.”
It can cause stress. When infants are around prolonged yelling — not shouting from, say, stubbing your toe — Keith notes that they can “begin to undergo toxic exposure of chemical responses that elicit the fight or flight response within the brain.” When people are exposed to the “fight or flight response” chronically, it can contribute to a number of health issues, including anxiety, depression and high blood pressure.
“When someone yells, everyone has a moment where their brain goes on high alert for danger and the sympathetic nervous system is activated to tell the body to fight or flight,” Horvitz adds. “Neurologically we’ll see stress hormones increase and physically the body may tense, heart rate may increase and breathing may become more rapid. It’s our body’s natural way to ready itself to run. Once we assess for danger and find the situation to be safe, our body’s parasympathetic nervous system kicks in to calm us.”
It can affect future relationships. “As babies grow older, and their brains have been exposed to excessive yelling or verbal aggression, they develop certain ‘attachment styles,’ which are the fundamental [determinants] of how infants and babies move into early childhood to build relationships with others,” Keith explains. “These templates of ways to build relationships are based upon early interactions with their caregivers.”
Horvitz adds that an infant who experiences “repeated yelling out of anger” may struggle with the following:
- Problems appropriately attaching to their caregiver, which can impact future connections to others, the environment and their own autonomy.
- Emotional regulation.
- Heightened sensitivity to anxiety as they develop into childhood.
- Milestone achievement, as “the environment is perceived as dangerous to explore and a caregiver as dangerous to interact with.”
Can yelling at a baby cause trauma?
“Infants are fairly resilient, but we are concerned about harm when yelling out of anger around an infant or towards an infant happens at a significant level of intensity or commonly in the home,” says Horvitz. “This will likely increase infant anxiety, which overtime may have an impact similar to trauma.”
“Infants are fairly resilient, but we are concerned about harm when yelling out of anger around an infant or towards an infant happens at a significant level of intensity or commonly in the home.”
— ARIEL HORVITZ, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST
Trauma, as defined by the American Psychogical Association (APA), is defined as an “emotional response to a terrible event, like an accident, rape or natural disaster.” The APA notes that trauma can cause “longer term reactions,” such as “unpredictable emotions, flashbacks, strained relationships and even physical symptoms like headaches or nausea.”
Can babies tell when parents or caregivers are angry?
According to Dr. Humaira Abid, a pediatric psychiatrist at OU Health in Oklahoma City, research has shown that “infants as young as 1 month can sense when a parent is depressed or angry.”
Horvitz adds that “anger is one of the first emotions humans can identify in others.”
“This makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint, as identifying anger may allow you to identify a threat to safety,” Horvitz says. “Babies may not have a full understanding of these emotions, the causes and how the angry adult will act, but babies will start to associate an angry caregiver as unsafe or scary.”
“Infants as young as 1 month can sense when a parent is depressed or angry.”
— DR. HUMAIRA ABID, PEDIATRIC PSYCHIATRIST
With this said, Horvitz notes that it’s “impossible to never feel anger as a parent or caregiver.” “Children thrive with the ‘good enough’ parent, meaning there will be mistakes but recovery and meeting your baby’s needs the majority of the time is important,” she explains. “It is common for caregivers with a new infant to feel overwhelmed and fatigued, which may lead to more moments of anger.”
Will babies remember shouting or yelling?
Yes and no. As Keith explains it: Babies may not have explicit memories like adults, but “their bodies store the information for later.” (Keith recommends the book “The Body Keeps the Score,” which explains the challenges of post-traumatic stress disorder on the developing child.)
“For instance, a baby may not remember explicitly the time they were yelled at in the kitchen booster seat when they were 6 months old, but their body remembers the way it recoiled, the way it pumped blood to increase oxygen to the muscles in response to feeling unsafe,” Keith explains. “This leads to behavioral patterns in conflict management and in relationship-building skills that help a baby move throughout early childhood, adolescence and adulthood in getting their needs met.”
Horvitz gives another example: “Babies can store memories as a sequence of reactions,” she says. “They may tense when they see their caregiver’s face move a certain way like how it did before yelling; or they may learn not to cry or to stay quiet while in distress due to the punishment of repeated yelling.”
How can parents and caregivers better manage and express anger?
While yelling can have negative effects on babies, anger is a normal human emotion that’s impossible to avoid. The goal as parents and caregivers shouldn’t be to never get angry at or in front of your child, but instead to find healthy ways of dealing with it.
Find ways to express anger in a healthy way
“Parents needn’t abstain from anger in the presence of their children,” Keith says. “In fact, when you find yourself angry, it’s a good time to lean in and demonstrate how you express it. We aren’t trying to shield our child from any and all discomfort. It’s more about modeling how to best express wants and needs.”
Practice soothing yourself and baby together
Keith recommends parents and caregivers engage in “dyadic affect regulation” when they’re feeling angry or frustrated with their baby — or put more simply, soothing oneself alongside another.
“When a baby is crying and you’re near tears due to feeling inept or overwhelmed, it is helpful to swaddle up the child, rest the baby on your chest and take deep breaths,” he explains. “This helps you slow down the baby’s breathing while also giving close proximity and touch to the child. As you both calm down, you may begin to rock, pat, sing or caress the child. These other forms of sensory interactions are considered therapeutic for both the child and the caregiver. You help the child by saying, ‘we are both overwhelmed, and it is my job to bring us both back down.’”
“When a baby is crying and you’re near tears due to feeling inept or overwhelmed, it is helpful to swaddle up the child, rest the baby on your chest and take deep breaths.”
— TYLER KEITH, LICENSED CLINICAL SOCIAL WORKER
Reach out for support
If you’re feeling overwhelmed as a parent, it’s important to get help. In addition to reaching out to a professional, Horvitz and Keith recommend the following resources:
- The Family Institute’s Transition to Parenthood Program. Horvitz notes: “This includes individual counseling, couples counseling, groups and even a podcast.”
- The Circle of Security. “This is a great free resource for caregivers built upon decades of research,” Keith says. “It’s a great support for those who are learning about infant mental health and overall socio-emotional well-being.”
- Postpartum Support International (PSI). From free phone calls with experts to online support groups, PSI is one of the nation’s leading support groups for parents experiencing postpartum depression, anxiety and other mental health issues.
