Do Men Really Not Hear Crying Babies?

Welcome to the Parenting Translator newsletter! I’m Dr. Cara Goodwin and my goal is to translate the scientific research into information that is useful, accurate, and relevant for parents. My new book, What To Do When You Feel Like Biting, is out this week and you can order it from Amazon here or from other retailers here.

It is an all-too-common scenario— a baby is up all night crying and an exhausted mother gets in and out of bed to care for the infant. The father sleeps soundly next to her, seemingly oblivious to the crying baby. In the morning, the father is shocked to hear that it was a “bad night” and insists that he didn’t even hear the baby crying.

So can research help us to settle this age-old debate— are men really less likely to hear babies crying at night? Is this simply a biological difference in hearing sensitivity or is there something more going on here?

A recent study finally addressed this debate. Here is what they found:

1. Men are slightly less likely than women to awaken to quiet crying sounds but are just as likely as women to awaken to louder crying sounds. The researchers found a very slight difference at the lowest decibel level (33 to 44 decibels— which is a little bit louder than a whisper) with women being 14% more likely than men to awaken to both crying sounds and alarms at this level. However, at higher decibel levels (which would likely be the actual decibel level of an infant crying on a baby monitor or in the same room), there were no differences in waking between men and women.

2. Mothers wake up with infants about THREE TIMES more than fathers. This study found that mothers woke up more frequently than fathers in most families. Only about 23% of families reported that mothers and fathers woke up an equal number of times at night. Only 1% of families reported that the father woke up more often than mother. This finding backs up previous research which consistently finds that women wake up with infants more often than men even when controlling for breastfeeding and whether both parents are employed outside of the home.

3. The very slight difference in hearing sensitivity between men and women cannot explain the significant differences in mothers versus fathers waking up