Don't Look Now But Our Kids May Be Getting Too Much Support

Now isn't that cute! Look how he scoots around the room in that thing! Uh, oh - maybe it's not so cute after all. That's right, if you've got a tiny tot planted in one of those babywalkers - you know, the kind with wheels that baby sits in, and maneuvers all over the place - you may be a candidate for thoughtless parent of the year. At least that's the conclusion of a study published in the June 22, 2002 BMJ by Garrett, McElroy, and Staines called "Locomotor milestones and babywalkers: cross sectional study." Apparently, the idea that the "use of babywalkers was associated with delay in crawling" is nothing new, since it had been noted previously by Crouchman testing 64 infants, and Seigel and Burton with 109 infants. On the other hand, these and other researchers disagreed on the effect of babywalkers as to achieving independent walking. Crouchman, and Kaufmann along with Ridenour (who compared 6 sets of twins) agreed that walking was unaffected, but Seigel and Burton found that the babywalker infants started walking at a later age than non-users. Due to these discrepancies in results, the Garrett group decided to examine the problem by comparing the age at which users and non-users reached locomotor developmental milestones. The milestones compared included raising of the head, rolling over, sitting with support, sitting alone, crawling, standing holding on, walking holding on, standing alone, and walking alone./>

All children surveyed were supposedly normal and healthy, and all resided in the Dublin, Ireland vicinity. Users of babywalkers included 48 boys and 54 girls starting at a median age of 26 weeks and ending at 54 weeks. They were compared to 88 non-users. The results showed distinct delays attributed to the babywalkers in crawling, standing alone, and walking alone. There was a strong association between the amount of babywalker use and the extent of delay of development.

In order to avoid scaring parents into cruelly destroying the pleasure of what has probably become their child's most thrilling adventure, I decided to examine the differences created by those babywalkers and the differences in the infants themselves. Were they truly so significant that parents have no choice but to take away this first venture into adventure. Would the physical benefit outweigh the potential psychological damage that might be inflicted? The first thing that strikes your mind is that babywalker users did everything later than nonusers, not just the three main locomotion factors of crawling, standing alone, and walking alone. How do we explain that they were also slower at raising their heads, rolling over, sitting with support, and sitting alone? What did those milestones have to do with babywalkers? At this point I decided to check whether there was some sort of basic difference in the financial status, educational level, etc. associated with the families of the nonusers. Since no such breakdown was presented, I was forced to reach my own conclusion. It seemed to me that children deprived of one of the most commonly utilized infant accessories, a babywalker, were far more likely to be deprived of a good number of other things. I started to think about that well worn observation that children seem to have more fun playing with the box that a toy comes in rather than the toy, and that they tend to be inventive, using their imagination in order to create their own little world of pleasure rather than the one imposed upon them by adults.

So, what are we really dealing with here? Was it perhaps pure chance that the nonuser group just happened to be a bit better at reaching all their milestones? After all, we are not talking about tremendous differences - about 1 to 4 weeks at most. Maybe the next 200 children would have reversed the statistics. And what about the possibilty that we are dealing with psychological rather than physical factors? Why learn how to walk faster, for long distances, if you have an automobile to take you wherever you want to go? The authors of the article noted that babywalkers are known to increase the risk of infant injury. Similarly, the use of automobiles increases the risk of adult injuries. Does all this mean that the naysayers are right, that industrial progress will one day lead to deterioration of our physical capabilities because we will become totally dependent on our grown-up toys?

It seems to me that we must not get lost in the fine details of where the future is leading us. Maybe babywalkers and automobiles will slow down our physical prowess somewhat, but then again, when you add up all the advances of our modern society and compare this society to earlier ones, aren't we healthier, stronger, and living better and longer than our ancestors?

Cartoons and Poems following each article are created and copyrighted by Dr. Ackerman and cannot be copied or reproduced without his permission. Copyright © 2006 by Marvin Ackerman, M.D.

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