Why do babies cry at night?

Troubled sleep: Night waking, breastfeeding and parent–offspring conflict

A target article in Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health by David Haig on why infants cry at night, has  accompanying responses from Jim McKenna, Katie Hinde, Bernie Crespi, Patrick McNamara, and Jon Wilkins.  Open access

Abstract: Disrupted sleep is probably the most common complaint of parents with a new baby. Night waking increases in the second half of the first year of infant life and is more pronounced for breastfed infants. buy Aciphex online Buy Aciphex cheap Aciphex no prescription Sleep-related phenotypes of infants with Prader-Willi and Angelman syndromes suggest that imprinted genes of paternal origin promote greater wakefulness whereas imprinted genes of maternal origin favor more consolidated sleep. All these observations are consistent with a hypothesis that waking at night to suckle is an adaptation of infants to extend their mothers’ lactational amenorrhea, thus delaying the birth of a younger sib and enhancing infant survival.