NDC neurobiological model: parental empowerment
"While the concept of the "good-enough mother" often gets translated into simplistic, quick reassurance about being OK with mistakes, it reflects a more profound truth. Imperfections are necessary for healthy development." Ed Tronick and Claudia Gold 1
"I would rather be the child of a mother who has all the inner conflicts of the human being than be mothered by someone for whom all is easy and smooth, who knows all the answers, and is a stranger to doubt." D. W. Winnicott 2
NDC focuses on clinical repair and 'growing joy in early life'
Unlike early intervention programs derived from social communication models, NDC does not instruct parents to avoid intrusiveness or directiveness, which may inadvertently communicate assumptions of parental incompetence and may also increase parental anxiety.
Similarly, NDC also does not employ tools such as the Neonatal Observation Scale to teach parents about their infant’s behavioral repertoire and communication competence in the first six months of life, which also inadvertently communicate assumptions of parental incompetence.3 NDC acknowledges that there is a place for the NBO in consultations with carefully selected, vulnerable families, but that the majority of families require help to remove the clinical barriers to enjoying interactions with their little one, rather than demonstrations that their infant is capable of sensitive to-and-fro communication.
NDC aims to address these barriers to enjoyable parent-infant communication, by offering effective, evidence-based strategies for helping with feeding or breastfeeding problems, crying and fussing, sleep concerns, an infant's sensory motor needs, and supporting parent emotional wellbeing and mental health.
NDC assumes parental competence
Instead, NDC educates parents about building moments of shared attention, regularly making the time for being present to their little one in to and fro communications. NDC encourages enjoyment of the baby. NDC proposes that parental competence and evolutionary drive for enjoyment of the baby will emerge in families once disruptive sociocultural and clinical advice are removed, underlying clinical problems are identified and repaired, and the importance of satisfying and socially engaged days outside the home explained.
NDC confidence in parental competence is corroborated by a study of 864 parent-newborn pairs observed spending time together as the baby lay close to the parent. Parents were given minimal instructions, but asked to interact with the baby comfortably, as they saw fit. Most of the 480 full-term newborns showed subtle affect-driven initiation of arm movements towards the parents as they interacted, though this was somewhat reduced in the prematurely-born infants, and all parents engaged in quiet and supportive interaction without being intrusive.4
Recommended resources
Handing power back to mothers and parents
NDC neurobiological model: parent empowerment
Woman-centred language and weight-inclusive care of breastfeeding and lactating women
NDC uses descriptive terms for anatomic features (instead of the surnames of famous men!)
Reframing from risk protection to engage families: words matter in safe sleep messaging. Professor Jeanine Young 29 April 2025 [Resource hub if you're NDC Accredited or in pathway]
References
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Tronick, E & Gold, Claudia. The power of discord. Scribe 2020
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Winnicott, D W. Winnicott on the Child, 2009. Grand Central Publishing
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Nugent JK. The competent newborn and the neonatal behavioral assessment scale: T. Berry Brazelton's legacy. Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing. 2013;26:173-179.
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Delafield-Butt JT, Freer Y, Perkins J, Skulina D, Schogler B, Lee DN. Prospective organization of neonatal arm movements: a motor foundation of embodied agency, disrupted in premature birth. Developmental Science. 2018;21:e12693.